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THEm HIST0B7 AS dATEEHEB FfiOM
THE HOLY SCBIFTUBES.

MARY L. T. WITTER,
Author of •' A Book for the Young."

I <» >

^^ All His ways are judgment.*^

HALIFAX, N. a. J

S. SELDEN, 71 GRANVILLtQ STREET.

1888.

PREFACE.

^S " all Scripture is given by inspiration of
God, and is profitable for doctrine, for
correction, for instruction in righteousness,"
surely the study of a people to whom refe-
rence is made — sometimes frequent reference
— in twehty-foiir of the books of the Bible
caniiot bei without proflt. That the history
of the Edomites is extremely fragmentary ij^
admitted, but that circumstance h&s been to
my mind an incentive to attempt the com-
pilation of one that is connected. The
young — and it is for the young only that I
write — would be unlikely to do this for them-
selves. I should much regret should any
make this little work a substitute for the
study of the sad story of Edom in God's
Word; but hope it may be an aid in that
study.

Among the works I have consulted I
would acknowledge my special indebtedness
to Josephus, Smith's Bible Dictionary, Bush's
Notes on Geiiesis, and Barnes' Notes on the
Acts of the Apostles.

MARY L, 1\ WITTER
Behwick, Nova Scotia.

Chapter.
I.-

11. -

iir.-

IV.-

V.-

VI.-

Vll.-
VIIL-

IX.-

X-

XI.-

XII.-

XIII.-

XIV.-

XV.-

CONTENTS.

Page.
-The Ancestry of the Edomites - - - 5

-Rebekah's Journey, - - - - - - - - 25

-The birth of Esao — He sells his birth-
right, - - - - ^ -.-'-- - 42

-Esau is DErRivED of his father's blessing, 55

-The land of Edom, 74

-Esau's interview with Jacob at the

Jabbok, 80

-The Horites, - - 92

-The Dukedoms an^ early kingdom of

Edom, 98

-DOEG, 102

-Hadad, 118

-Edom, a dependency of Judah, - - - - 131

-The Kingdom of Edom, 138

-The Herodian family, 144

-The Herodian family, (Continued), • - 171
-The Conclusion, - - - - 193

CHAPTER I.

THEIR ANCESTRY.

ISAU, oi' Edom, from whom the Edomites
*f5; descfinded, and from whom they derived
their name, was the twelfth from Noah, and
the twenty-second from Adam. Among his
ancestors are to be found all the eminently
pious men of whom there is a record, who up
to his time had lived. Of two of these it is
said by the spirit of truth that they " walked
with God," an expression denoting the closest
similarity to God of which the human soul
in its earthly tabernacle is capable ; and one
of Esau's ancestors, Enoch, delivered the only
antediluvian prophecy which has come down
to us. The prophecy is remarkable for its
early date— man having been then on the
earth less than a thousand years — and for its
contents. Enoch speaks of ungodly men
doing ungodly deeds in an ungodly manner ;
and of saying hard things against the great
God ; and also of the ultimate triumph of
right, as the Lord would come as Judge,
attended by a vast number of angels. As

THE EDOMITES.

far as we know, Enoch was the only man of
his age who was conscious of the existence
of angels. May he not have been so Godlike
as to have had this consciousness without any
special revelation ?

Esau's immediate ancestors were scarcely
less remarkable for their piety than those who
were more remote ; both his grandfather and
his father being noted for their unwavering
faith, their unquestioning obedience, and their
cheerful submission to the Divine will. To
Abraham appertains the high honor of being
called the friend of God — an honor which is
unique in the history of the Old Testament
saints. Though Abraham and Isaac were
altogether dissimilar in their mental charac-
teristics, they were severally endowed with
qualities which fitted each for his peculiar
duties. Abraham was energetic, resolute,
decided, magnanimous. Isaac was meek,
gentle, forbearing, enduring, not resisting
evil, but overcoming evil with good. To
Abraham it was easier to do than to suffer ;
to Isaac it was easier to suffer than to do.
Abraham so loved adventure that it was not
a very heavy trial to leave his country and
many of his kindred to go he knew not
whither, to soiourn he knew not where. To
Isaac it was a privilege to be under parental
protection, and subject to parental control;
and he so loved peace that for its sake he
would even give up the valued possession of
a well of living water. But diverse though

THEIR ANCESTRY.

they were, they both so loved and reverenced
God that he was not ashamed to be called
their God. The Infinite One seemed even to
delight in acknowledging his relations to
them, often designating himself the God of
Abraham, and the God of Isaac. These two
men are among the small number of our fallen
race whose residence in glory is an historic
fact.

Though Abraham was comparatively
young when he received the promise that his
seed should be so numerous as to be fitly
compared to the stars in the firmament or
the sand on the seashore, yet his brow was
whitened with the snows of a whole century
before Isaac was bom ; and for Isaac a wife
was not sought till he had seen four decades
of years. Even then it seems to have been
the steward of the household, not Isaac or
his father, who was the first to move in the
matter. It is presumable that Eliezer had
heard the heartrending groans of Abraham
as he looked on the finely chiselled features
of his beloved Sarah cold in death ; that he
had seen his tears as they fell in quick suc-
cession on her marble brow ; that he had
witnessed his agony when he perceived that
his dead, though deader to him than all the
living, must be buried out of his sight ; that
he had stood by his side as he bargained for
Macpelah's cave ; that he had seen him weigh
the four hundred shekels of silver and pay
them to Ephron; that he had assisted in

THE EDOMITES.

carrying the remains of his late mistress to
her final resting-place ; that he had reverently
looked on, as Abraham according to the cus-
tom of his native Ur, laid the corpse on its
left side with a bowl filled with dates in its
hand, and the right hand laid over the bowl
as if the departed were eating ; that he had
observed how his limbs trembled and every
muscle quivered as he motioned to be led
homeward ; and as deep grief has a strong
attractive influence when experienced by one
who is already an object of kind solicitude
and tender love, did not Eliezer from this
time love Abraham with an intensity to which
he had hitherto been a stranger, and watch
over him henceforth as affectionately and
untiringly as a mother watches over her
babe ? May we not conclude that his efforts
to comfort and soothe were unavailing ? Did
he not plainly see that the heart of his master
was desolate, and at length come to the con-
clusion that the presence of a daughter-in-law
would be the best remedy for his loneliness ?
It is probable that Eliezer, full of this new
project, on his own responsibility entered on
a negotiation with some of the Canaanites
among whom he dwelt, relative to the pro-
curing of a wife for his master's son, and that
Abraham no sooner learned of the well
intended efforts of his steward than he re-
solved to give these efforts another direction.
Though at this early age of the world there
was no law prohibiting the followers of the

»^'

THEIR ANCE0..IY.

9 '/

true God from intermarrying with idolators,
yet Abraham instinctively shrank from allow-
ing his son to enter into such a relation. He,
therefore, called Eliezer to him and required
of him an oath to the effect that he would
not take a wife to his son from among the
people by whom they were surrounded, but
go to his country and to his kindred and take
for him thence a wife. Eliezer was accus-
tomed to the most prompt obedience to the
commands of his master, but, like every o^her
pious man, he feared an oath, and, in his
opinion, it was at least possible that he would
not be able to find a suitable woman who
would consent to accompany him .so great
a distance in order to become the wife or one
whom she had not even seen. He suggested
the difficulty, and asked if he should conduct
Isaac to Abraham's native land. There are
times in the experience of every man in which
reasons for and against certain measures are
so evenly balanced that it is difficult to decide
as to the path of duty. Thus it was with
Abraham in the instance before us. He
doubted not that it was the will of God that
Isaac should marry one connected with his
own family ; he felt, too, that the feare of
Eliezer were not without foundation, ycb
might not Isaac, if he went among his rela-
tives, be persuaded there to remain ? God
had promised that the land in which he then
sojourned should become the possession of his
descendants, and he had lived in reference to

MM!

THE EDOMITES.

that promise. Confident that God's promise
coTild not fail he had purchased a family
burial-groun^^ and already he had there made
a most precious deposit, and had directed that
his remains should be there interred. But if
Isaac should go to Haran, and there reside, it
would be a virtual abandonment of the
promise, and would not that be dishonoring
the Promiser? With these considerations
before his mind Abraham told his steward
not to conduct Isaac to Haran. God would,
he believed, send his angel before him and
hence his efforts would be successful ; but if,
as Eliezer had suggested, the woman chosen
should not be willing to follow him, he should
be released from his oath. Eliezer no longer
hesitated, but " sware to him concerning the
matter."

All the goods of Abraham were in the
hands of his steward, and he, far more solici-
tous about the honor of the family than were
they themselves, made ample arrangement
to exhibit their rank and wealth. He, taking
jewels of silver, jewels of gold, changes of
raiment, the choice fruits of his favored land,
ten camels, and a number of men-servants,,
set of£

The long, toilsome journey is passed over
in silence. Intent upon his errand — the ob-
taining of a wife for his master's son — the
difficulties encountered are patiently and even
cheerfully endured. May not Eliezer be cor-
sidered as a type of the servants of God

THEIR ANCESTRY.

seeking a bride for their Master, Christ ? and
has he not set an example of self-abnegation
which it would be well for all such to follow ?
When Eliezer arrived at the city of Haran
he halted by a well in its suburbs, as he knew
that it v/as the custom for young women of
all ranks of society to go out at eventide to
draw water, and hence he would have a
favorable opportunity for prosecuting his
business. Eliezer, believing in combining
prayer with effort, now presents his case
before God. There, are some who act as if
religion was not designed to influence their
conduct toTvards any except the great God,
and approach him in prayer, while a servant,
a child, or a domestic animal, suffers on account
of the time chosen for devotional exercises.
Such was not the piety of this man. There
is much doubt in my mind whether, if Eliezer
had lived in modern times and in this climate,
he would have enjoyed the service^ of the
sanctuary while his horse was standing
exposed to winter's chilling blasts and piercing
cold. At any rate, we find him caring for the
comfort of his camels, and causing them to
kneel — their usual posture of rest — before he
offers prayer. One reading the narrative
seems to see the weary, aged man on his knees,
with hands uplifted to heaven, and hear him
plead for the success of the undertaking, and
for such and such tokens as proof that God
would show kindness urto his master. This
prayer is invested with peculiar interest, as it

THE EDOMITES.

is — if we except one ejaculatory prayer — the
first on record. One would not expect to find
any of Abraham's household altogether igno-
rant of the true God. Irrespective of their
nationality he would acquaint them with
man's fall, and the implied promise of man's
redemption. But while some knowledge and
some faith might reasonably be looked for in
a servant of Abraham, the degree of faith
exercised -by Eliezer is very remarkable, and
his humility is scarcely less remarkable than
his faith. In both those respects he resembles
one who, in regard to time, is about midway
between him and ourselves to whom the
adorable Redeemer said : " 0 woman, great is
thy faith."

Vague indeed must have been Eliezer's
conception of the wonderful Personage in
whom all the families of the earth should be
blessed ; but his faith triumphed over his lack
of knowledge, " for it is a distinction of faith
that it can receive a mediation it cannot
distinctly trace and admit into the conscious-
ness what it cannot master in thought.'*
Though he did not understand how it was
effected, he evidently felt that a way was
opened by which sinners could be reconciled
to that Being who cannot look upon sin
without abhorrence, and that, through the
merits of the Eeconciler he could draw near
to God. His humility, however, prompted
him to make the appeal for his master rather
than for himself, and to designate the Al-

THEIR ANCESTRY.

mighty the God of Abraham rather than his
God. To us who have the precious Bible and
are familiar with the strangely kind words :
" The very hairs of }^our head are all number-
ed," it is a delightful, heartfelt fact that the
Infinite One, who humbles himself to behold
the things which are in heaven, does take an
interest in all that concerns his children, and
that nothing, however trifling in itself, that
adds to or interferes with their comfort is
thought beneath his notice. So great is God
that to him nothing is insignificant. But that
Eliezer, with so little knowledge of God,
should believe that events would be so over-
ruled that she who was destined to become
the wife of Isaac should say just such words
and perform just such acts evinces faith of no
ordinary character. He believed in God's
sovereignty.

While Eliezer was engaged in prayer,
Rebekah, the daughter of Bethuel, Abraham's
nephew, came out of the city with her pitcher
on her shoulder to draw water. She was
very beautiful, and Eliezer at once conceived
the hope that she was to be the wife of his
masters son. He evidently believed that
before we call God answers, and while we are
yet speaking He hears ; and that he is so
willing to bestow benefits that they not so
much follow our prayers as go before them.
Rebekah does not appear to have heeded the
presence of the stranger, but, as if quite alone,
" went down to the well and filled her pitcher

THE EDOMITES.

■

and came up." Eliezer was not one of those
who pray and then act as if they neither
expected nor desired that their petitions
should be granted. His conduct was in con-
formity with his prayers. He did all in his
power to bring about the answer. When
Rebekah had filled her pitcher and was about
to re-enter the city he ran to meet her, and
most respectfully asked: "Let me, I pray
thee, drink a little water of thy pitcher."
The few moments which intervened between
his request and her answer probably seemed
to him quite a length of time. He may not
have known that there was a devil, and the
devil was not then as fearfully malignant a
being as he is now, but one can scarcely
doubt but Eliezer was tempted to think God
had not heard his prayer. Hope and fear
struggled in his heart. But if the temptation
was sharp it was short. With joy he heard
the courteous reply : " Drink, my lord ;" and
afterwards her very kind offer to draw water
for the camels. " He was filled with admiration
of the Divine providence which had made the
event to correspond so exaotly with his desires.
The maiden's conduct, so amiable in itself, and
so exactly in unison with his previous wishes,
struck him with a kind of amazement, accom-
panied with a momentary hesitation whether
all could be true."*

After Rebekah had watered the camels
Eliezer gave her a nose-ring and two bracelets

* Bush.

THEIR ANCESTRY.

of gold, and asked her father's name, and
whether he, 'vflth his attendants and camels,
could be accommodated at her father's estab-
lishment. Rebekah, in reply, told him not
only the name of her father, but also the
names of her paternal grandfather and grand-
mother, and that without inconvenience the
wants of the whole company could be sup-
plied. Pleasantly did the names of Nahor
and Milcah fall on the ear of Eliezer. Often,
no doubt, had he heard his master Abraham
speak of the grief he experienced when Lot,
Milcah and Iscah were left fatherless by the
early death of his brother Haran, and of the
consultation held between Terah, Nahor and
himself, in which it was decided that Lot
should be a member of his family till he
chose to assume the responsibility of an inde-
pendent household, and that Milcah and Iscah
should respectively become the wives of Nahor
and himself. The name Bethuel, too, was one
with which Eliezer could not have been unac-
quainted. Long years had passed without
any communication between Nahor and
Abraham when one came from Mesopotamia,
and told that Nahor and Milcah were the
parents of eight sons, ^f whom Bethuel was
the youngest. The names of these sons, from
Huz to Bethuel, though hardly household
words, were never forgotten.

How did it happen that Rebekah told
Eliezer so much of the history of her family ?
May one hence infer that the Lord had by

THE EDOMTTES.

dream, or vision, or mental impression, or
celestial visitant, told Rebekali that Abraham
was about to send a servant asking her to
become the wife of his con, the heir to gre«t
possessions and still greater promises ? As
the great God is so near to us that he lays his
hand upon us, as in him we live and move
and have our being, can he not at his pleasure
and in whatever manner he sees fit acquaint
us with coming events ? Does he not some-
time^ do so in this late age of the world?
Does it not even appear that more prophets
are to be expected under the present dispen-
sation tha^ those that preceded it ? Does not
the prophet Joel declare that in the days in
which we are living old and young, male and
female, should be blessed with the spirit of
prophecy ?

It is presumable that the parents of
Rebekah were surprised that she lingered so
long at the well, and still more surprised when
they saw the golden ring by which her face
was adorned and the massive golden bracelets
which encircled her wrists, and heard what
Eliezer had said. The stranger who had
bestowed such valuable gifts, was accompa-
nied with so many servants, had so large a
number of camels, and, above all, who had
manifested so deep reverence for the great
God, evidently had made an impression on
the mind of the young girl, and her descrip-
tion of what she had seen and heard made
scarcely less impression on the minds of the

THEIR ANCESTRY.

other members of the family. Laban, the
brother of Rebekah, without delay went out
to invite the traveller to accept of his hospi-
tality, intimating that as he was a servant of
God he was peculiarly dear ; and added : " I
have prepared the house and room for the
camels." To us who are acquainted with the
character of Laban, and have seen his merce-
nariness in disposing of his daughters, his
duplicity in his dealings with Jacob, and his
idolatrous practices, his effort to appear gen-
erous and pious but lessen him in our estima-
tion. To ' Eliezer, however, he probably
appeared a generous, warm-hearted, and godly
man. Laban was one of that class of men,
not yet extinct, with whom it is better to
have a slight than a thorough acquaintance ;
for those who knew him best esteemed him
least. Eliezer, pleased to find himself at the
end of his journey, gladly accepted the prof-
fered hospitality, and received the most
Qourteous and respectful treatment. But he,
far more anxions about the faithful discharge
of the business on which he had been sent
than about procuring ease and comfort for
himself, refused to eat till he had told his
errand. One listening to his story cannot
fail to be impressed with his uiiselfishness as
a man, his fidelity as a servant, and his trust-
fulness as a believer. He says nothing of the
alacrity with which he undertook the journey,
of the toil he had endured, nor of the respon-
sible position he had long filled in the house-

THE EDOMITES.

hold of his master. But he exalts Abraham,
tells of his flocks and herds, his silver and
his gold, his men-servants and his women-
servants, his camels and his asses, and then
very adroitly refers to the fact of Abraham's
advanced age, and that he had given his vast
possessions to Isaac. He, too, ingeniously
intimated that Isaac's bachelorship was not
the result of unpopularitj; among the women
of Canaan, but from his father's desire that
he should obtain a wife from among his own
kinswomen. He then told of his prayer at
the well, and of the remarkable answer to
that prayer. Bethuel and Laban listened
eagerly to the narrative, and when tit its close
Eliezer asked lor their decision, they told him
that it was so evidently tho will of God that
Rebekah should become the wife of Isaac that
every objection was silenced. Eliezer, be-
lieving in particular providences, received
their decision as coming from God, and in
accordance with this belief acknowledged
God's goodness first, and then manifested his
gratitude to the family by the presentat'on of
several very valuable gifts. His mission
being thus brought to a successful termina-
tion, he partook of the offered refreshment,
and retired to rest.

Let us now pause for a liitle to learn some-
thing of the historyof the I'amily with whom
Abraham's servant is lodging. Haran, where
they at this time were living, is situated in a
beautiful tract of country between the Khe-

waam

THEIR ANCESTRY.

bour and the Euphrates, below Mount Masius.
But this was not the home of their ancestors.
Ur of the Chaldees was their home. Terah,
the grandfather of Bethuel, was the father of
three sons. Haran, who was the eldest, and
but the half-brother to the other two, died
early in his Chaldean home. Here Terah
hoped and expected to live and die. But such
was not the will of God. He appeared to
Abraham and commanded him, saying : " Get
thee out of thy country and from thy kindred,
and come into the land which I shall show
thee." Though Abraham, it may be, had
never before beheld any manifestation of
God's presence nor had ever heard him speak,
he knew God had commanded and he deter-
mined to obey. Like many who in these
later times set out for the heavenly Canaan,
he, it may be presumed, encountered opposi-
tion, and, as has often happened, his firmness
and decision caused others to accompany him.
There are few who do not mentally fill
up this part of the Scripture narrative. One
seems to see the tears of Sarah and to hear
her lamentations as she hears that her
husband has resolved to leave Chaldea. One
also seems to hear the remonstrance of Terah.
He may have been willing to admit that, in
the early history of man, the great God often
conversed with his servants, and had given
them visible tokens of his presence ; but cen-
•turies had elapsed since he had been seen, or
his voice had been heard. He would, per-

TWWSW"

TlIE EDOMITES.

haps, also maintain that the command itself
was absurd, and, therefore, could not have
b ^iven by God. Would God command
him to leave the wife ho had so lately
espoused, leave his father whom he, by the
nature of things was required to honor, and
enter on a life of wandering which would end
he knew not when or where? Abraham
could not prove that God had either appeared
to him or addressed him, though he doubtless
was as sure of both as of his own- existence,
and, therefore, told his father that he knew
God had commanded and he was resolved to
obey. The late quiet of the family would
now give place to disorder and confusion,
earnest entreaty, and heartless recrimination,
and ' Abraham had to endure that trial so
painful to the sensitive heart — foes in his own
household. The sequel shows that Sarah, or
Sarai as she was then called, decided that
since her husband had decided to leave Ur
she would go too, and, with true wifely feel-
ings, chose to shaT'e his adventures, whatever
they might be, rather than be parted from
him. Lot afterwards concluded that since his
uncle and she who stood to him in the double
relation of sister and aunt were about to
leave he would not be left behind ; and finally,
to the equal surprise and delight of Abraham,
Terah declared his intention of going too.

Knowing, as we do, that it was to Abra^
ham the command was given, and that he was
willing to go alone, one is struck with the

THEIR ANCESTRY.

pliraseology of Scripture relative to the de-
parture ot* these persons from Ur. " Terah
took Abram his son, and Lot the son of Haran
his son's son, and Sarai his daughter-in-law,
his son Abram's wife, and they went forth
with them from Ur of the Chaldees." Do
not these words show that Abraham so hon-
ored his father as to place him at the head of
the emigrating party ? They travelled as far
as the city in which we now find Eliezer,
remained there until the death of Terah, and
then went to the land of Canaan. When or
wherefore Nahor and Milcah removed to
Haran is left entirely to conjecture.

Though Laban was fond of being seen and
heard, yet the fact that Bethuel, on so im-
portant an occasion as the giving of his
daughtf"' in marriage, stands so entirely in
the back ground, forces the conviction on us
that he must have had some infirmity of
mind or body which incapacitated him for
the proper performance of his duties as head
of the family.

Eliezer remained at the house of Bethuel
only one night. Anxious faithfully to per-
form his mission, he arose at the early dawn
of the morning and respectfully and earnestly
entreated : " Send me away to my master."
The request to return immediately seems not
to have been anticipated ; and to take an only
daughter from her parents may be likened to
depriving them of the fragrance of flowers,
the song of birds, and the light of the sun.

THE EDOMITES.

Is there on earth any other relation so tender
as that which exists between mother and
daughter ? Is it possible that even a husband,
however affectionate, considerate and devoted
he may be, can sympathise with his wife as
does a daughter with her mother? That
Rebekah's mother should be unprepared to
part with her daughter with so short a notice
cannot excite surprise. Desirable as it was,
in their opinion, that Rebekah should marry,
and honorable as was the proposed connec-
tion, they shrank from her immediate depar-
ture. Now they became the suppliants.
** Let the damsel abide with us," said they, " a
few days, at lee^st ten, and after that she shall
go." One feels that the middle clause in this
sentence came from the lips of the mother.
No one ever comes between a daughter and
her mother without causing the latter a pang.
God only knows the severity of that pang.

Though Robekah's family were very desir-
ous that she should remain a little longer with
them, yet, as they had consented to the pro-
posed union, Eliezer now had the first claim
to her, and he wished with as little delay as
possible to depart. Rebekah is called on to
decide. It is to her, scarcely less than to her
mother, a trying hour, the more so as on her
is laid the responsibility of a decision. She
was doubtless unwilling to leave her mother,
but she was convinced that it was the will of
God that she should go, and that his claims
upon her were infinitely superior to those

TUEIR ANCESTRY.

snder
and

t>and,

/oted

fe as

That

ed to

lotice
was,

larry,

►nnec-

lepar-

liants.

ey, " a

B shall

in this

lother.

jr and
pang.

p.ng.
desir-
rwith
I pro-
claim

^ay as
on to

Ito her

m her

She

[other,

rill of

jlaims

those

of the fondest mother, or the most devoted
father ; and, perchance, feeling the kindlings
of the Hame of love toward the man who in
a far-oft' land was waiting to receive her, she,
with the most heroic decision, the most
amiable frankness, and the most charming
naivete, replied, " I will go."

Preparations were at once made for the
journey. Not only from what Eliezer had
said, but from his retinue and from the muni-
ficent presents of which he had been the
bearer, it v/as evident that the family into
which Reb^^kah was about to marry was one
of great wealth, and both herself and her
friends would naturally be solicitous that her
dower and the number of her attendants
should be such as was fitting her position.
It was well for both mother and daughter
that there were many things which required
their attention, for such is the structure of
the human mind that earnest, energetic action
does much to lessen the acuteness of feeling.

There is no record of the parting scene
except the wish expressed by Laban that the
descendants of Bebekah should be numerous
and powerful ; but no description could be so
touching as is this silence. One seems to see
the mother as, in tearless, speechless agony,
she clasps Rebekah to her bosom and smothers
her with kisses, and then retires to her room
and pours out hor soul in prayer. One seems
to hear the scarce audible whisper, " God bless
my child." She rises from her knees, paces

THE EDOMITES.

to and fro — she does not dare trust herself to
look upon the receding company — and again
bowing before God presents the same petition,
" God bless my child ! God bless my child !"

The name of but but one of Rebekah's
attendants is given, that of her nurse Deborah.
We may presume that she voluntarily followed
her young mistress to her new home in a far
distant land. As she is one of the few women
mentioned in the Bible with whose burial-
place we are made acquainted, and as she was so
much lamented that the oak under which she
was laid was thence called Allan-backuth, (the
oak of weeping), it may be pretty safely pre-
dicted that see was truly pious. That she
was greatly mourned is the more remarkable
from the fact that she, at the time of her
death, was very aged, having lived about one
one hundred and twenty-six years after she
left Haran. The pious, and the pious only,
become more and more loveable as they
increase in years. There is no more beautiful
sight on earth than the old man or woman
growing the more cheerful in faith as feeble-
ness increases, and more and more mellowed
in love, and pervaded and brightened by
religion as the limbs tremble and the outward
senses become dull. It has been said that the
devil has no happy old people. The Lord
has. " The path of the just is as the shining
light." And the nearer the believer ap-
proaches the true Light the more brightly
does that Light shine on his path, and the

REBEKAH S JOURNEY.

brighter the light which he himself emits.
It is when flesh and heart fail that God is
most emphatically the portion of his people.
Though "the keepers of the house shall
tremble, and the strong men bow themselves,
and the grinders cease because they are few,
and those that look out of the window be
darkened," yet even then " light is sown for
the righteous, and gladness for the upright in
heart."

CHAPTER II.

REBEKAH'S JOURNEY.

one

Ling
ap-

itly
the

HIS journey, which was a distance of
about five hundred miles, must have
been rather a formidable undertaking. Now
a journey of that length can be performed in
two or three days, then it occupied long, weary
months. The first great difiiculty would
probably be the crossing of the Euphrates, the
largest and longest and most important river
in western Asia, and, even where most shallow,
of very considerable depth. There were no
bridges at this early date, hence the manner
in which Rebekah and her nurse and maids
were conveyed over the river must remain a
matter of conjecture. As there is not even a
hint relative to their route there can be no
certainty as to the tract of country through
which they passed, but one may presume that

THE EDOMITES.

after crossing the Euphrates they traversed
the fertile plains of Damascus, through dis-
tricts familiar to Eliezer, and through the
plateau of Bashan, afterwards the kingdom
of Og, and then entered Gilead. Travellers
have described the scenery from this elevated
tract of country as very fine, at times almost
enchanting, its plains being covered with a
fertile soil and its hills with forests, and pre-
senting at every turn new and varied features
of the landscape. The caravan, for thus may
this company of travellers be designated,
crossed, one may presume, the swiftly flowing
Jabbok and the muddy, circuitous Jordan,
both of which are now rich in historic inte-
rest; the former for a mysterious contest
between God and man, and the latter for
having been thrice miraculously divided, and
more especially for having been the baptismal
font of the Son of God. Having reached the
western side of the Jordan we may imagine
them travelling south-westerly till they come
to Luz, and thence nearly south till they reach
Salem, the capital of the kingdom of Mel-
chizedec. The origin of this king i,« so
obscure that he is described "as being without
father, without mother, without descent," and
although he was living in the midst of an
idolatrous people he was a priest of the most
high God — the first priest of which there is a
record. The sight of Salem would naturally
remind Eliezer of events which had occurred
some fifty years previously, and one imagines

REBEKAH S JOURNEY.

lost
is a

lily

Ted
ines

him telling the story to Rebekah as follows :
" When your cousin Lot was living in Sodom
it, with the neighboring cities, was invaded by
Cherdorlaomer and three other kings, who
carried off not only much spoil but also many
of the inhabitants, among whom were Lot
and his wife and daughters. My master, on
hearing of this disaster, immediately armed a
few hundreds of his trained servants, and
with his three friends, Aner, Eschol and
Mamre, pursued the plunderers. They were
overtaken on the northern limits of this
country, just after they had bivouaced for
the night. When my master came in sight of
the watch-fires of the enemy he, dividing his
men into four companies, placed them seve-
rally under the command of himself and his
three confederates, and commanded that not
one word should be spoken, and that noise-
lessly as possible they march upon them and
make a simultaneous attack in four different
quarters. The darkness 'of the night was
favorable to the manoeuvre, and it was at-
tended with the most decided success. Cher-
dorlaomer and the accompanying kings evi-
dently supposed that *^iey were surrounded
by a numerous army, for they fled with the
greatest precipitation. Anxious only to pre-
serve their lives they left both their captives
and their spoils. They, however, were not
permitted to escape unhurt, but were pursued
as far as Hobah, and many of their number
slain. Your cousin Lot fell at my master's

THE EDOMITES.

feet and prayed for blessings on my master's
head, but Lot's wife seemed to rejoice more
over the goods that had been retaken than
over the rescue of her daughters. It was on
that eminence yonder," he would say, " that
Melchizedec met my master with bread and
wine for the refreshment both of himself and
his attendants. These were gratefully re-
ceived, and my master gave Melchizedec tithes
of all that had been retaken. The whole
matter was to me inexplicable. I could not
understand why my master should treat even
this man, king and priest though he was, as
his superior, but I have since learned that he
was a type of the promised Seed. It was
there in that dell that Bera, the wicked king
of wicked Sodom, came to my master, and,
instead of expressing his gratitude for the
rescue of so many of his subjects, he assumed
great generosity, saying, ' Give me the per-
sons and take the goods to thyself.' The
goods were the la\tful property of my master.
But he, rich in the promised blessing of God
who cannot lie, and fearing that his motives
in the rescue of the captives might be mis-
construed, together with the fact that Bera
was an unprincipled, vain-glorious man, had
solemnly sworn not to retain any portion of
the spoil, and so returned all to its former
owners."

As there were at this time, and, indeed,
for more than three centuries afterward, few
families in Canaan who were worshippers

rebekah's journey.

ister*s
more
than
7 as on
" that
d and
If and
ly re-
tithes
whole
Id not
t even
oiSf as
aat he
t was
I king
and,
)r the
!umed
e per-
The
aster.
: God
Dtives
mis-
Bera
had
on of
)rmer

deed,
few
ppers

of the trae God, Abraham and Melchizedec,
though residing at a distance from each other,
and meeting but seldom were doubtless true
friends. If they knew, and it is presumable
that they did, that the one was a t^oe and
the other an ancestor of him who was to
bruise the head of the serpent, with what
reverence would they regard each other, how
exalted would be their intercourse. It is
strange that believers ever speak contempt-
uously of each other, however they may differ
in social position, educaMon, or intellectual
power, since they are children of the same
Father and heirs of the same inheritance ?

The heart of Kebekah was, no doubt,
pained as she from time to time met with
evidences of idolatry even in its most revolt-
ing forms. It is qnite possible that it might
have so occurred that as she was passing the
ravine, afterwards known as the valley of
the son of Hinnon, the welkin rang with the
sound of the toph and cymbal, intermingled
with shrieks of agony ; and if Rebekah asked
what it meant she would be told that a babe
had just been offered to the idol Moloch. She
would be further told that, although the
mother was a devotee to that horrid idol, and
had voluntarily given her first-born for the
sin of her soul, yet when she heard the cries
of her babe her mother nature so triumphed
over her religious prejudices as to cause her
to utter the fearful shrieks which had been
heard, and that in this country such scenes

THE EDOMITES.

: - fl

were not unfrequent, for mothers were taught
that the sacrifice of a child, especially if that
child be the first-born, was the most merito-
rious of all acts. "Though the religious
element," Eliezer would say, " is a component
part of the very soul of woman, yet in sacri-
ficing her female children she may not be
actuated wholly by religious motives, for life
here among this idolatrous people is to woman,
for the most part, barren of enjoyment. In
nothing else does the household of my master
contrast more strongly with the households
by which we are surrounded. In his family
females are loved, protected, honored, and the
life of the weakest infant or the most de-
crepit old woman is guarded as carefully as
his own life."

As they came within sight of Mount
Moriah Eliezer would naturally recall the
tragedy which occurred there some fifteen
years previously, and almost as naturally he
would relate the strange story to Rebekah,
especially as he whom she was to marry was
the designed victim of that tragedy. Eliezer
would tell Rebekah that Isaac was from his
infancy the object of his father's tenderest
and deepest affection, and that he was not less
surprised than pained when, after the boy
had risen to manhood he received the com-
mand. "Take now thy son, thine only son
Isaac, whom thou lovest, and get thee into the
land of Moriah, and offer him there for a
burnt offering upon one of the mountains I

kebekah's journey.

taught
if that
nerito-
Jigious
ponent
I sacri-
not be
for life
roman,
it. In
master
jeholds
family
nd the
)st de-
illy as

Mount
,11 the
fifteen
lly he
Dekah,
y was
lliezer
m his
ierest
)t less
3 boy
com-
Y son
bo the
for a
ins I

will tell thee of." Eliezer would, no doubt,
also tell Rebekah that his i aster knew that
no such command had been given in the whole
history of man, and that the great God had
said : " Whoso sheddeth man's blood by man
should his blood be shed." And besides, to
take the life of Isaac would seemingly render
the fulfilment of the promise impossible, but
so strong was his master's faith that he
accounted that God was able to raise Isaac up
even from the dead. If Rebekah expressed
astonishment that such a sacrifice should be
commanded by God, or would be at all accept-
able to him, she would be toJd that it is quite
possible that the great God had a special
object in view, namely the trial of Abraham's
faith, love and obedience, and the teaching of
the doctrine oi substitution. These remarks
were probably followed by a number of ques-
tions by Rebekah as to how Isaac was afiected
by the command. Did he believe that God
had so ordered ? Was he willing that his life
should be thus cut short, or did he determine
to resist ? Did he resist, or how did it happen
that the command was not executed ? These
questions, or such as these, would very likely
follow each other in such quick succession
that Eliezer would make no attempt to reply,
but when her excitement subsided so far as to
render an answer possible he, perhaps, told
her that, with her permission he would relate
the story to her just as Isaac had told it to
him, and would proceed about as follows :

THE EDOMITES.

"In risinf^ one morning at the usual hour I
was surprised to find the household all astir.
The servants were running hither and thither,
one waf } making cakes, another cleaving wood,
and another stiU bringing two asses from the
field. I saw at once a journey was contem-
plated, and, on enquiry, learned that my father
was about to set off for the land of Moriah,
and that he had told the servants that it was
his will that I should accompany him. There
was a peculiar tenderness in the expression
of my father's countenance, and he seemed
even more than usually solicitous that I should
be supplied with every comfort. Be fastened
on my ssndals with his own hands. I en-
treated him not to perform so menial an office,
but he assured me that he regarded it as a
privilege. We were soon on our journey.
My father and I walked together, and were
followed by two servants, the one carrying
wood and the sacrificial knife, and the other
leading an ass laden with provisions. My
father talked but little, and seemed blind to
the beauties of the ever-varying landscape.
He ate but little too, and slept still less than
he ate. More than once he half audibly
whispered. * I will make thy seed as the dust
of the earth ; God has said it, and his word
cannot fail of fulfilment/ and at times when
he would half Jose himself in sleep he would
say, * It must be, yes, it must be/ and then
press me to his heai'fc as If he feared some one
would take me from him by force. On the

rekekah's journey.

morning o2 the thii'd dp.v after we left home
I awoke at early dawn and missed my father
from my side. I aro^e at onc^e and went in
search of him. At length I found him
kneeling on the cold ground, his head wet
with dew. his han<^]s and eyes uplifted to
heaven, his body swaying to and fro, and
every lineamenc of his face bearing the ex-
pression of unuttecabitj anguish. I looked on
him with awe, and haidly dared approach
him. He was usually sere oe and een happy,
Wherefore now this agony ? Wiiy did he
conceal its cause from me ? These and simi-
lar questions suggested themselves, but to
them I could furnish no answer.

" When we came to the base of Mount
Moriah my father told the servants that they
need proceed no further. 'I and my son,*
said he, * will go yonder and worship, and we
will return to you again.' He then laid the
wood on my shoulders, and, taking the sacri-
ficial knife and a brand from the fire by
which the servants were preparing their meal,
bade me ascend with him to the top of the
mount. My father's step was uneven, his
knees trembled, and his face was livid as
death. We walked on in silence till silence
to me became unbearable, so turning to him I
said, ' My father.' He started as one awaked
suddenly from a deep sleep, and after gazing
on me a few minutes he replied, ' Here am I,
my son.' I called his attention to the fact
that, though we were provided with the wood,

THE EDOMITES.

the knife, and the fire for a burnt-offering,
the offering itself was wanting. For some
time my father was choked with emotion, and
then in a tremulous voice he said, * My son,
God will provide himself a lamb for a burnt-
offering.' The thought occurred to me then,
for the first time, that I was about to be
sacrificed. This enabled me to understand
what had been before wholly unaccountable
in my father's conduct. Though I knew that
if my father intended to sacrifice me God had
so ordered, yet a shudder passed over me, and
my first impulse was to resist. We were
alone, and in physical strength I was by far
my father's superior. I looked at the knife
as it glistened in the sun, and the blood
curdled in my veins. Soon, hpwever, I had
such a view of the goodness and mercy of
God, accompanied with such a sense of his
favor, that I had no fear of death even in
the form which, but a little before, had
seemed so terrific. I felt that it would be
but the door of a better life, higher joys,
and a more exalted state of existence. Never
was I more tranquil than when building that
altar, and placing the wood in such a manner
that it could not fail to burn as soon as
touched by fire. When all the arrangements
were completed my father tenderly clasped
me to his heart and pressed his quivering lips
against mine, and then, taking the girdle from
his loins, he bound my hands and laid me on
the altar. He placed his left hand under my

REBEKAHS JOURNEY.

cliin, and in his right hand held the glittering
knife. I expected in a few moments to be
ushered into the unseen world, but felt no
fear either of the anguish of the death-stroke,
or of the pangs consequent upon dissolution,
or yet of the untried state on which I was
about to enter. But, while I felt no fear, I
lived an age in that moment of time. My
whole life appeared as a panorama before me,
and oh, how different it seemed then from
what it had previously ! I had long thought
that I loved God but then saw that my love
was so far below what it ought to be that it
scarcely could be called love. I had thought
that I regarded God with great reverence, but
then I had such a view of his purity that my
deepest reverence seemed irreverent, my
highest conception of his holiness altogether
ui\worthy of his nature, and that I ought to
humble myself on account of the pride of my
most profound humility, and repent of my
most sincere repentance. I, too, felt my obli-
gation to love, honor and obey my parents as
I had never felt it before ; I saw it was a sin
to swerve from the wishes of my father, or
to refuse to comply with the requirements of
my mother. Some things which I had hardly
thought of as sins, then arose in terrible array
against me, such as a lack of regard for the
feelings of my father's servants, or indifference
relative to the comfort of our domestic ani-
mals. But notwithstanding the long catalogue
of crimes which might justly be laid to my

THE EDOMITES.

cl)u,i"'e, T knew that 1 was foroivcn tlirounh
the iiitn'its ot* One who, in (he n.g'\s to come,
was to bruise the head of the serpent, and
that, thou^jh sin was in me it was not on nie,
but on the prouiiocd {Seed ; arCi that when the
union between <iOa'it and body was dissolved
I should enter into g'ory. I raised my eyes
to my lather, wish-ng to >speak some word ot
comiort to him: but he was in no ncvid of
com Tore. His face, which but a moment
before was expressive of unutterable agony,
tiien shone with a )u>.c;re scarcely less resplen-
dent than that which emanated from the
cherubim which kept the way to the tree of
life. I seemed to see God as I looked on
him. Every emotion of my father's heart,
every faculty of his mind was evidently so
attracted toward God that his love for me
was comparative hatred. Every other desire
was destroynd by or absorbed in his desire to
glorify God. Just at this moment a voice
from heaven called * Abraham ! Abraham T
The voice was one with which my father had
long been acquainted, but which I had never
heard before, and yet I knew and rejoiced to
know it was the voice of God. I loved to
think of him as near. God's almightiness
had filled me with terror; then, though I
quivered with awe, I yet rejoiced in it.

"When my father heard God speak he,
ready and willing to obey any and every
command of God, gladly responded : ' Here
am 1/ The great God then addressed my

UEBEKAUS JOURNEY.

he,

rery

.ere

fafclicr thus : * Lay not thy liand upon the hid,
neither do anythin<^ unto him ; for now I
know that thou fearest God, seeing that thou
hast not withheld thy son, thine only son,
from me.' 4s God spake my father saw a
ram caufcht and held hy his horns in a thicket.
I arose from the altar, and this ram, which
God had caused to wander thither for the
express purpose, was oflered as a sacrifice."
Rebekah, one imagines, had listened almost
breathlessly to the no vrative, and when Elie-
zer ceased to speak she asked, " Was the ram
slain in Isaac's stead ? Do the animals sac-
rificed die in our place ? Can there be eflBcacy
in their blood ? Sacrifices must point to
something in thv^ future, but to what, to
whom ? All seems to me mysterious, so
mysterious ! More is known, I think, of
God in your master's household than in my
paternal home. About all I know of God is
that he is an independent Being, and a holy
Being, and, knowing that I am both sinful
and dependent, I am never quite easy, as I
fail to understand how I can become recon-
ciled to him."

The return journey from Haran to Lahai-
roi was quite unlike that from Lahai-roi to
Haran. Then the travellers were all men,
now they were a mixed company. Then
there was some uncertainty as to the result
of their enterprise, now that enterprise had
been brought to a successful isLue, and they
were conducting a bride to her husband.

THE EDOMITES.

EJiezer and Deborah were doubtless happy,
buc they could not have been merry ; they were
carrying too heavy responsibilities for that.
The other travellers were among the merriest
of the merry. Those connected with Abra-
ham's household would never weary telling
of his silver and gold, camels and asses, men-
servants and maid-servants, and Rebekah's
maids would be as eager listeners as they
were speakers ; but while they listened eagerly
to a careful observer it would have been
apparent that they were anxious to make it
appear that Bethuel was no less important a
personage than Abrjiham. But there was one
in this company for whom this long journey,
with its consequent toil and privations had
been undertaken, who was shielded from
every danger, relieved from every care, whose
every wish was anticipated, but who must have
been very far from being merry. Indeed her
reticence might have been, by some, mistaken
for sadness. Rebekah, no doubt, had learned
that God had promised Abraham that all
nations sho\ild be blessed in him, and that it
was in the line of Isaac that the Deliver was
to come ; and like Mary, the mother of that
Deliverer, she pondered these things in her
heart, so pondered them as to be at times
oblivious of what was passing around her.
She thought on the seemingly strange promise,
and, one may presume, questioned within
herself whether it could be possible that she
should be the ancestress of that wonderful

'"JO

REBEKAH^S JOURNEY.

was
that

her
times

her.

lise,
tthin

she

jrful

•;:m

personage who was to exercise so powerful an
influence on all generations. All mankind
blessed in an individual ! How blessed ?
Wherefore blessed ?

Rebekah's mind would also at times be
occupied with the lesser but not unimportant
question whether or not her husband would
be pleased with her. Might it not so happen
that while she bore the name, and enjoyed
the amenities of a wife, some other woman
would have the chief place in Isaac s affections ?

Eliezer had, no doubt, despatched a mes-
senger on a swift dromedary to Abraham^
informing him of the success of the under-
taking, of the manner in which Rebekah was
employed, and of her conduct through the
whole affair ; and, if he was a close observer
of human nature, he would be able to form a
pretty correct opinion of his prospective
daughter-in-law. That she was obliging,
industrious, and courteous he could infer from
her readiness to give water to a stranger, and
from her drawing water for ten camels. That
she possessed a large share of modesty might
be pretty safely predicated from her spending
no unnecessary time with the travellers ere
she informed her parents of their coming, and
her decision of character would be learned
from, her prompt " I will go."

As with Rebekah so with Isaac, though in
an inferior degree, the period of time occupied
by the journey could not have failed to be one
of anxiety. A woman depends vastly more

iii!

'■•>' : i

THE EDOMITES.

for happiness on her husband than does a man
on his wife. Indeed it may be said that she
is happy or miserable as is his will. Not so
with a man. Many sources of enjoyment are
open to him, even though his home be not a
happy one. But as Isaac was to be the hus-
band of one whom he had never seen, and of
whose tastes and inclinations he was neces-
sarily in a great measure ignorant, he would
naturally question within himself whether
she would be a true help-meet, soothing his
cares and anxieties, sharing his toils, allevia-
ting his sorrows, and in the hour of pain and
sickness be the tender, affectionate, self-sacri-
ficing nurse, or would she be one of the too
numerous class of women who consider their
own ease and comfort of paramount import-
ance, and think themselves injured if anything
is allowed to cross their plans or interfere
with their wishes.

At eventide Isaac went out to pray or
meditate in the fields. Was it his custom to
spend the hour of twilight in intercourse
with heaven, or did he retire to pray, on this
occasion, because his anxieties were too heavy
to endure unaided ? Either view exhibits his
piety in a favorable light, for^ in a season of
absorbing worldly interests he is found seek-
ing communion with God.

Having finished his devotions, as we may
presume, and being on his return to his tent,
he sees the caravan approaching. For many,
days it may have been expected, and much

•.T.gl

kebekah's journey.

anxiety may have been experienced relative
to its safety. Fear is always commingled
with hope in regard to anything which very
materially affects our happiness. Again and
again Isaac may have strained his eyes to
learn if something might not be seen of them
in the distance, but now "he lifted up his
eyes and saw, and behold the camels were
coming." The self-same ten camels that had
set off from Lahai-roi, and on one of these a
fair young girl was seated whom he knew to
be his bride. He at once went to meet her.
Isaac was happy, inexpressibly more happy
than he would have been had he not felt that
his bride was a gift from God ; for religion
enhances joy as much as it mitigates sorrow.
It is the privilege of the believer to receive
every blessing as coming from the hand of a
loving father, and to be sure that these blessings
will be continued as long as their possession
is for God's glory or his good.

The solitary man walking in the field was
not less noticed by those who composed the
caravan than they were by him. Rebekah
seems to have been the first who observed
Isaac, and, on learning who he was, she at
once dismounted and caused herself to be
covered with the bridal veil ; by the former
act she avoided treating Isaac as an inferior,
and by the latter she showed her subjection
to him as her husband. I can scarcely avoid
remarking in this connection that every true
woman shuns every act that could be con-

!MI!

THE EDOMITES.

strued as implying that her husband is her
inferior. Though in this enlightened Chris-
tian land a conventional superiority is acceded
to woman, she is far from arrogating to her-
self that superiority.

When Rebekah dismounted, her attendants
doubtless dismounted too, and walked in pro-
cession till she was presented to her husband.
Isaac conducted Rebekah to his late mother's
tent, and, as Deborah raised the veil, he would
look for the first time on the face of his bride.
Rebekah possessed personal charms of a very
high character, and the respect and admiration
which the report of Eliezer had ^'' cited, as
we have supposed, now culminaie^L in love.
The sacred historian exhibits the conjugal
happiness of the newly-married pair in an
equally pleasing and impressive manner by
the following words : " He loved her ; and
Isaac was comforted after his mother's death."

CHAPTER III.

THE BIRTH OF ESAU — HE SELLS HIS
BIRTHRIGHT.

[HE happiness ot parents should always
^ be increased by the addition to their
femilies of sons or daughters-in-law. New
relations do not releas . us from our obliga-
tLons to those already existing. It is both sad

ESAU: HE SKLLETH HIS BIRTHRIGHT. 43

and surprising that when men become hus-
bands and women wives they sometimes act
as though they thought themselves treed from
filial duty. If they do not say, '* It is a gift
by whatsoever thou mightest he profited by
me," they virtually declare that all their
attention, time, and money are needed for
their own families. It is indeed true that,
"If any man provide not for his own, and
especially those of his own house, he hath
denied the faith and is worse than an infidel."
But parents are always included in a man's
"house," however remote their dwelling from
his own. These thoughts have been suggested
by reflecting on the change which would be
made by Rebekah's presence in Abraham's
household. But Isaac's character warrants
the belief that he would ever be the affec-
tionate son. It is reasonable to conclude that
the man who tenderly mourned for his mother
for three years would ever be respectful,
attentive and affectionate toward his father.
He surely would not allow all his time to be
monopolized even by his young and beautiful
wife. Isaac must have felt that his father
having sent Ishmael away that there might
be none to interfere with his rights, and
afterwards for the same reason the six sons
of Keturah, placed him under peculiar obli-
gations to make the declining years of his
father not only comfortable buu happy.

It is somewhat remarkable that although
Bebekah v/as a wife twenty years before she

THE j:domites.

became a mother, no impatient word relating
to the matter escaped her lips. She knew
that He who was to bruise the serpent's head
was to descend from Isaac, and, as year after
year elapsed, she must have feared, if not
expected, that the line was to be continued
by some other than herself. But in this
matter, as far as we are able to judge, God's
will was hers. Isaac could have lawfully
taken another wife ; but his ardent love for
Rebekah prevented him from doing so. He
went to God and entreated him to give chil-
dren by her. Isaac expected to be heard,
and was not disappointed. "The Lord was
entreated of him." O the amazing conde-
scension of the Infinite One to permit frail,
erring man to have power with him ! What
encouragement this instance affords to make
all our wants known to God, whether these
wants be of a spiritual or temporal nature.
God cares for us. He desires our happiness ;
and if we lack those things which are neces-
sary to make us happy it is either because we
ask not, or ask amiss. A father may be indiffe-
rent to the wants of his child, and even a
mother, with all her wealth of love, may
become indifferent too, but God never. Human
love, even in its loftiest heights and deepest
depths, is but hatred when compared with
love divine. Among the many proofs of God's
love is his willingness ever to listen to our
prayers. Some, when they kneel to pray,
ask for what they think they ought to desire,

ESAU: HE SELLETH HIS BIRTHRIGHT. 45

not for what they really do desire. This is
not prayer; for prayer is the asking for
the supply of felt wants, the outpouring of
the soul to God, and may be wholly inaudible,
or expressed in words, or cries, or sighs, or
groans. To the believer prayer is a perfectly
natural exercise, insomuch that there is not
even one believer on the face of the earth who
does not pray. To the learned and the illite-
rate, the weak and the strong, to the babe in
Christ and the matured Christian, prayer is
alike necessary. Often the last woros of the
dying saint are words of prayer. Does the
Word of God teach that the exercise of prayer
is to cease with this life ? While very little
— much less than is generally supposed — is
revealed of the future state, is there not pre-
sumptive evidence that prayer is offered by
the redeemed in glory ? The souls of the
martyrs are represented as praying, and we
are expressly taught that our Adorable
Redeemer, at the right hand of the Father,
intercedes for us. Will not the saved desire
to know more and still more of God, and to
be more and still more like Him ? And will
not these desires find expression in prayer ?
May it not be that through endless cycles
prayer will be continually offered and contin-
ually answered ? Can the finite ever so
nearly approach the Infinite that there will
be nothing to desire, or for which to ask ?
Will not the period arrive in which the human
soul will as far exceed its present capacity as

(

!')!

THE EDOMITEa

it now exceeds the capacity of the lowest
orders in the animal kingdom ? And when
arrived at that exalted state will it not see
moro in God to desire than it does in its present
condition ; and will not these longings of the
soul to be like God increase in strength as its
capacity increases ; and will not these longings
find expression in prayer? May it not be
that through the illimitable future God will
be continually pouring out of himself into
the soul, and yet the soul be more and more
conscious of its own littleness when compared
with Him ? And will it not then, with an
emphasis unknown on earth, exclaim : " Who
in the heaven can be compared unto the Lord ?
Who among the sons of the mighty can be
likened unto the Lord ? And when, after
countless ages, the glorified spirits have been
increasing in knowledge and holiness, will
they not with all the strength of their exalted
powers, with all the depth of their sanctified
affections, with a degree of reverence to
which saints on earth are strangers, pray God
to make them more and still more like him ?
It is very significant that those who are " in
the midst of the throne and round about the
throne" are represented as most deeply
impressed with the perfections of God.
" They rest not day and night saying, Holy,
holy, holy Lord God Almighty, which was
and is and is to come." Are not the words,
" Blessing and honor and glory and power be
unto him who sitteth upon the throne, and to

Bi»»ra>.* .n.***

ESAU; HE SELLETH HIS BIRTHRIGHT. 47

the Lamb for ever and ever," in effect a
prayer; a prayer offered by the glorified
hosts ?

The reader will pardon this digression, and
return to the narrative. God gave Rebekah
twin boys, and while the younger had the
soft, velvety skin of ordinary infants, the
elder " was red all over like a hairy garment,"
and was thence called Esau. This family was
now a very h*ippy one. Rebekah, like the
mother of her husband, would exulting
exclaim, "God hath made me to laugh, so
that all that hear will laugh with me." And
the scarcely less exultant would say, " I
love the Lord because he hath heard my
prayer, and attended to the voice of my sup-
plication." Abraham too, though bowed
under the weight of one hundred and three-
score years, would fondly clasp the little ones
to his bosom, but his thoughts would not be
so much on them as on Him who was to be
a descendant of the younger babe, and
through whom all the families of the earth
should be blessed. He saw the day of Christ
and was glad. If one excepts the parents
and grandfather, none would be more pleased
with these infants than I^eborah. She would
be scarcely less happy than the fatlier, or less
devoted than the mother. Few persons can
have failed to observe with what readiness
women, who have no children of their own,
lavish the wealth of their affections on chil-
dren entrusted to their care. This is well,

THE EDOMITES.

Ii;i

\i''

both for the nurse and tii? cliild. The child
generally reciprocates the love of the nurse,
and where it is not reciprocated it is far from
being a useless expenditure. Love is the root
from which happiness springs^ and by which
it is nourished. It is even more blessed to
love than to be loved ; and one is not only
happier but better for loving. This is most
emphatically true if the love be toward God,
and measurably so if toward man.

Deborah, it may be presumed, had the
chief care of Esau from his birth ; and Re-
bekah's partiality for Jacob may have arisen
in part from his being more dependent on her
than was Esau for his well-being and well-
doing. Those mothers sustain heavy losses
who entrust their children to the care of
others. Among the losses may be numbered
a lessening of their children's love toward
themselves, and of their love toward their
children.

As there had been a striking difference
between the babes, so as they became lads it
may be- presumed they manifested contrary
dispositions. The one mild, gentle, submis-
sive, affectionate, the home-child, the darling
of his mother, and at the same time artful,
subtle, insidious ; the other possessing all the
physical energy of both parents, their fiercer
but not their gentler qualities, bold, rest-
less, impatient of restraint, adventuresome,
averse to ordinary labor, delighting in the
capture of wild animals, and deriving as

ESAU: HE SELLETH HIS BIRTHRIGHT. 49

much delight from the pursuit, from the diffi-
culties to be overcome, and even from the very
dangers to which he was exposed, as from the
capture itself; and yet, with these varied
qualities, loving, forgiving, generous, brave.
The divergence in their characters would
naturally increase as the boys became men ;
for, being then under very little control, their
natural tendencies would be developed into
full strength. Esau became a fearless ranger
of the mountains, a wild, fierce, and cunning
hunter ; and Jacob a plain man, dwelling in
tents. Isaac was contemplative, and so was
very naturally drawn toward his son who was
his opposite — active and daring. But the
reason assigned in the Scriptures for this
preference is such as would not be suspected,
seems unworthy of a pious man, and detracts
from the respect which his general character
elicits. " Isaac loved Esau because he did eat
of his venison." It was an infirmity and not
a sin, but a most contemptible infirmity.
" Kebekah loved Jacob." The reasons for her
partiality are not given; but among those
which suggest themselves may be mentioned
his being the object of her special care, the
prophecy relative to him which had been
uttered while he was yet unborn, and the very
fact that Isaac preferred the other son. " But
whatever may have been the grounds of these
preferences, it is clear from the sequel that
nothing could be more unhappy than the
consequences to which they led. The dis-

THE EDOMITES.

tresses which embittered the remainder of
Isaac's life are to be traced directly to this
source ; teaching us by an impressive exam-
ple the lesson which all parents may expect
to learn from the exhibition of a similar
weakness. A distinction among children,
while it sows the seed of discord between the
heads of the household themselves, produces
effects upon its objects equally disastrous. It
kindles the flames of jealousy and resentment
between brothers and sisters, and renders the
heart, which should be the seat of every
gentle and kindly emotion, the habitation of
anger, malice, and revenge ; and if such baleful
passions do not break out into deeds of vio-
lence and blood it will be simply because a
kind providence in some way interposes, and
spares those that have sown the wind from
reaping the whirlwind."*

Esau s natural disposition was somewhat
sanguinary. This would influence him in his
choice of employment, and his employment
would so react upon him as to render him
more sanguinary still ; for the heart that does
not become more softened by witnessing the
sufferings of either men or brutes becomes
hardened. The great Creator, in order to
increase the comfort of his creature-men, has
given him permission to kill the lower ani-
mals ; but he who does not slaughter in such
manner as to inflict the least possible amoun
of pain is guilty of cruelty which the amiable

E.fi
i

*Jiush.

ESAU: HE SELLETH HIS BIRTHRIOHT. 51

Cowper has fitly designated the most devilish
of all vices ; and there is no vice of which the
reflex influence is more pernicious. To cause
happiness is to be thus far like our Father in
heaven. To cause misery is to be like the
devil.

An incident connected with Esau's occu-
pation as a hunter determined, humanly
speaking, his destiny for life, and that of his
posterity to all generations. On one occasion
he became so excited in the pursuit of game
that he was oblivious '^f thirst, hunger and
fatigue, and when it was at length captured
he was nearly exhausted. Slowly and wearily
would he thread kis way homeward. He
would sit down to rest, but needing food quite
as much as rest, he would again rise and urge
himself forward. The stalwart man would
be so overcome with fatigue that he would
bow beneath his burden, lay it down, and
proceed without it ; but, reflecting on the
disappointment his father would experience
should he return empty-handed, he would
retrace his steps and, again throwing the car-
cass over his shoulders, would finally reach his
home. He was very hungry before, but his
desire for food is greatly stimulated by the
appetizing fragrance of vegetable soup. The
weary, hungry man would throw down his
game at the door of his tent, and entering
find, to his disappointment, that it is neither
his mother nor one of his servants who is
preparing the soup, but his brother Jewjob,

THE EDOMITES.

between whom and himself there is but little
sympathy. Esau would not expect much
favor from Jacob, but would hope to exchange
a part of the game for the coveted food. He
would tell his brother what he had captured,
and request him to take as much of it as he
wished and in return give him some of the
soup. To this the subtle Jacob would reply
that he did not care for the game, but he
might perhaps be induced to part with the
food in course of preparation, on which he
had bestowed so much pains, if Esau would
take it in exchange for his birthright. Esau,
thinking only of his present necessity, an-
swered : " Behold, I am at* the point to die ;
and what profit shall this birthright do to
me ?" Jacob, no doubt, had long been devis-
ing plans for obtaining the exalted privileges
connected with primogeniture ; and indulged
trie hope that by some costly sacrifice they
might become his own. But when he per-
ceived that Esau was willing to part with it
for a single meal he would be nearly beside
himself for joy. He, however, w^ould conceal
his emotion, and, as if quite indifferent about
the matter, say it would really be a disap-
pointment, after all this trouble in preparing
his favorite dish, to part with it for an uncer-
tain good ; but, since his brother wished the
food so much, he might have it if he would on
oath renounce his birthright. Esau took the
required oath, and ate the lentile soup. Ah !
never since our first parents ate of the tree

ESAU: HE SELLETH HIS BIRTHRIGHT. 53

of the knowledge of good and evil was food
so dearly purchased. But Esau, so far from
expressing any regret relative to the bargain,
or endeavoring to induce Jacob to cancel it,
" ate and drank and went his way," as if per-
fectly satisfied with the transaction.

There are few, perhaps none, who do not
condemn Esau's conduct in this matter, yet
there are many who may find in him their
prototype. Those who, in this land of Bibles,
neglect the great salvation, are guilty of a
folly compared with which Esau's conduct
was wisdom. His conceptions of the spirit-
ual blessings he forfeited must have been
very vague, while we live in the full blaze of
gospel light. " If I had not," says Christ,
"come and spoken unto them they had not
had sin ; but now they have no cloak for
their sin." Is it not possible there are some
surrounded by religious privileges who so
neglect to improve these privileges as to be in
a measure ignorant of what God requires of
his rational creatures ? Does the ignorance
of such at all palliate their guilt ? Is it not
itself a great sin ? One in vain enquires how
Esau was afiected by his father's removal to
Gerar; what he said relative to the Philis-
tines filling the wells which had been digged
by his grandfather; how he brooked the
request to leave the country; whether he
assisted his father in building the altar at
Beersheba; and whether he there called on
the name of the Lord, for to these questions

liif^

■I

M; 4 ■!

■

' '■

[>■■

THE EDOMITES.

the Bible does not furnish an answer ; but is
it not nearly certain that the spirited words
addressed to Abimelech, Ahuzzath and Phichol,
though coming from the lips of the passive,
forbearing, peace loving Isaac, were virtually
the words of Esau ? When Esau was forty
years old he married two women, probably
not at the same time, but within a year.
These were both descendants of Canaan, the
son of Ham, whom Noah cursed. Isaac knew
full well that his father had been at great
pains to prevent him from forming a similar
connection, and there can be little doubt but
he and Rebekah were much grieved on account
of Esau's choice, and an intimate acquaintance
with their daughters-in-law developed traits
in their characters which by no means atoned
for their nationality.

The young reader will perhaps ask why
the wives of Esau are called by different
names in the history from those they bear in
the genealogical table of the Edomites..
Though there have been various opinions
relative to these names, as well as the differ-
ent names and different nationality ascribed
to the fathers of these women, yet candor
obliges the writer to admit that to her the
subject seems involved in great if not hopeless
obscurity.

Polygamy invariably leads to other evils ;
and this was more especially the case when
ungodly women were united to an ungodly
man. As children were born into the family

wmnwiiinirtMtiMMi 'Ji'iniiiBiia"

ESAU LOSES THE BLESSING.

domestic difficulties would increase, each
mother endeavoring to promote the comfort
of her own children, though at the expense
of all the others, and each jealous lest the
father should prefer the children of the other
wife or wives to her own.

Among the many blessings brought to
women by Christianity is the limiting of man
to one wife. In this respect she is raised to her
primeval state. She is no longer either a chat-
tel, a toy, or a slave, but is nourished and
cherished and even honored. Now her love
can be fully reciprocated, and her devotion to
her husband be rewarded by like devotion-
There is now true union, the union of hearts.
The husband is in truth the house-band, and
she and her children with him form one house*

CHAPTER IV.

ESAU IS DEPRIVED OF HIS FATHER'S BLESSING.

tHE thirty-five years which follow Esau's
marriage is altogether barren of any
record relative to him ; but when he reap-
pears on the historic page he is still the
favorite of his father, who was quite blind,
and bearing the burden of something more
than thirteen decades of years. Isaac being
under the impression that he would soon die,
called Esau to him and requested him to pro^

."•^.-•*M'jM*feL'jfe^^ti^.;

';■ f '■

fid

THE EDOMITES.

i
1-

cure venison and prepare savory meat in order
that he might eat of it and then bless him,
and thus confirm hyn in all the blessings and
privileges connected with priority of birth.
Isaac was, it may be presumed, ignorant of
the fact that Esau had sold his birtiiright^
and Rebekah ad been made acquainted with
it, and this renders the conduct of both of
them relative to the blessing less irrational
than it would otherwise appear.

It so occurred that Rebekah heard the
words of Isaac addressed to Esau, and no
sooner had he gone in search of game than
she concocted a plot to deceive her husband
which is almost unparalleled in history, and
is an indelible stain on her otherwise blame-
less character. As a daughter she was dutiful,
modest, industrious; as a bride trustful,
loving, decided; and, as a wife, faithful,
patient, submissive ; but now, when the snows
of more than one hundred years had passed
over her, she is seen not only deceiving her
husband, but also encouraging her son in lying
and imposture, and exhibiting so little fear
and reverence for the great God as to express
her readiness to incur his wrath.

Rebekah called her son Jacob to her and
desired him with as much despatch as possi-
ble to kill and dress two kids, telling him
that she would make of them savory meat
such as his father loved and that he by carry-
ing it to his father would find no difiiculty in
procuring the blessing for himself. But

ESAU LOSES THE BLESSING.

though Jacob was extremely anxious to obtain
his father's blessing, and by no means over
scrupulous as to the means employed, yet
he hesitated, for he feared that his father
might detect the fraud, and in that case he
would bring upon himself not a blessing but
a curse. He mentioned his fears to his
mother, and her answer, "On me be thy
curse, my son," showed the intensity of her
love toward him, and, at the same time, the
obtuseness of her moral perceptions. It is
vain for any one to offer to bear the punish-
ment due to the sins of another. Our own
sins if not atoned for will crush us beneath
the anger of Almighty God forever and for-
ever ; and so great are our obligations to him
that even in the holiest and most self-sa<;rifi-
cing lives there are no works of supereroga-
tion which can be set against the former sins
of the individual or the sins of any other
person. The great God has a right to the
most fervent love, and the most cheerful
obedience of every one of his creatures during
the whole period of their existence. He and
He only who was holy, harmless, undefiled,
and separate from sinners, could bear our
sins, could be made a curse for us. Jesus
Christ possessed life in himself and of him-
self, and had a right to dispose of his life as
it pleased him. His sufferings consequently
were vicarious. His death bought life. His
blood cleanses from sin.

We will now have a look into the tents

; I

THE EDOMITES.

belonging to the aged patriarch. In one we
seem to see Isaac as he lies alone, his sightless
eyeballs turned toward the door, and his head
raised on one hand that he may the more
easily catch the first sound of Esau's foot-
steps. The other tent is in strong contrast
with this, for in it the greatest activity pre-
vails. Two kids have just been slain, and the
very choicest pieces having been selected are
now in course of preparation for the table.
Though maid-servants are not wanting in the
establishment, this food is considered of too
much importance to be entrusted to any one
except the mistress of the family. The
savory meat having b^en prepared, Rebekah
assists her favorite son in the arrangement of
his dress, which is far from being of the ordi-
nary character. The sacred stole, the sole
right of the first-born, is brought forward,
and in it Jacob is arrayed, and portions of
the skins of the kids which had been killed
lire fastened on his hands and on the smooth
of his neck. She then gave the savory meat
fuid bread and wine into Jacob's hands, and
he enters his father's tent. Would he not
hesitate ? Would he not be half inclined to
relinquish the project ? May it not be that
he did turn toward the door, but his eye
meeting the eye of his mother, which seemed
to accuse him of cowardice, he determined to
go forward, whatever might be the result.
Summoning all his fortitude he walks toward
the patriarch, and, with a husky voice, says

ESAU LOSES THE BLESSING.

ess
jad
ore
>ot-
■6ist
»re-
the

"My father." The aged man is as one
awakened from a dream. He had been pro-
bably listening for the sound of Esau's foot-
steps, and was not aware of the presence of
anyone till he heard himself addressed.
Arousing himself he replied, " Here am I ;
who art thou, my son ?" Jacob answered
that he was Esau, the first-born, and that
having complied with his father's request it
but remained for him to eat of the venison
and pronounce the blessing. The fears of
Isaac were excited. The voice was the voice
of Jacob, and it was strange that the game
should have been caught and the savory meat
prepared in so short a time. Isaac asks for
an explanation, and Jacob tells him that the
easy capture of the animal was to be attrib-
uted to God's aid. Isaac now thinks of a test
in which he, though blind, could not be
deceived — that of touch — and causing Jacob
to come near to him feels of his neck and
hands and finds them to be hairy — the dis-
tinguishing characteristic of Esau. It must
be my first-born thought Isaac, yet he once
more, with the greatest earnestness, puts the
question : Art thou my very son Esau ?
Jacob now tells the fourth lie, and sets the
mind of the patriarch at rest. The venison
and bread are now eaten and the wine drunk
and Isaac blessed Jacob saying :

** Therefore God give thee of the dew of heaven,
And the fatness of the earth,
And plenty of <Jorn and wine ;
Let people serve thee,
And nations bow down to thee ;

E! Il

li'!.

■H-i

60 THE EDOMITES.

Be lord over thy brethren,
And let thy mother's sons bow down to thee ;
Cursed be everyone that curseth thee,
And blessed be he that blesseth thee."

Poor Jacob ! he obtained the blessing, but
at a tremendous cost. He was guilty not
only of deception and repeated lying, but also
of profanity. Little did he imagine when he
listened to his mother's solicitations how
deeply he would be plunged in guilt. He
would have shuddered at the thought of
using the name of God irreverently ; but
before the scheme is accomplished he dares
use that holy name in connection with a lie.
Little did Cain suppose when he first indulged
in angry feelings toward his brother Abel
that he would imbrue his hands in that
brother's blood. Little did David think when
he entertained the first impure thought
toward Bathsheba that he would be guilty of
adultery and murder; and little did Judas
expect when he abstracted the first coin —
perhaps of very trifling value — from the
common purse that he would betray his
Master. " It is one of the most fearful perils
of deviation from the right way that no
bound is set to it. The transgressor knows
not whither it will lead him."* It is uselesfi
for one to say that he will go so far in an evil
course and then stop. He may not, he prob-
ably will not, have the power to stop. Such
is the nature of sin that the man who

* Conant.

ESAU LOSES THE BLESSING.

indulges in it finds that each descending step
renders it the more difficult to avoid the next.
His moral power to return to the path of
wisdom is continually decreasing, while more
and still more power would be required for
that purpose. May not the religious talent,
the power to honor, love and obey God, by
disuse become entirely extirpated ? Is there,
then, hope of salvation for such an one ?

The conduct of both Rebekah and Jacob
in this affair merits the severest censure, and
cannot be contemplated, even at this great
distance of time and place, without pain ; yet
the designs of God were thus accomplished,
his will fulfilled. But had Jacob absolutely
refused to listen to his mother's suggestions
he, doubtless, would have obtained the
blessing, for God will bring about his own
purposes. A Being of infinite resources, infi-
nite power, and infinite wisdom, cannot be
frustrated in his designs. Let none, there-
fore, under any pretext whatev'^r, "do evil
that good may come."

Jacob had but just gone out from his
father's presence when Esau, having returned
from hunting and having prepared the savory
meat, brought it to Isaac, saying, "Let my
father arise and eat of his son's venison, that
thy soul may bless me." The mind of the
aged man was filled with surprise, grief, and
anguish, and he called out, " Who art thou ?"
Isaac could scarcely believe it possible that
he had been duped ; for had he not taken the

THE EDOMITES.

r":l

precaution to feel the hands of the man who
had brought him the venison before he ate it ?
and were they not hairy ? and was not that a
characteristic in the physique of Esau which
was unique and which could not be counter-
feited? and yet the present speaker had
Esau's voice ; what could it mean ? For some
time Isaac remained silent convulsed by agony.
In the forcible words of Scripture, "He
trembled very exceedingly." And when his
tumultuous feelings allowed him to speak, he
cried "Who, where is he that hath taken
venison and brought it to me, and I have
eaten of all before thou camest and have
blessed him." When a sudden calamity over-
takes a man his character appears for the
time at least in its true light, and Isaac is
never more clearly seen to be the true believer
than in this unexpected trial. His faith in
God triumphed over his partiality as a father,
and now it may be for the first time fully
comprehending the import of the words, " The
elder shall serve the younger," he meekly
submits to the divine will and with the deepest
solemnity addgj, " Yea and he shall be blessed."
Esau seeing his father's decision was filled
horror, and the welkin rang with his wail of
woe. He was the prey of hatred, anger, and
remorse. He cried with an exceeding great
and bitter cry, and when his passions became
so moderated as to render words possible, he
plaintively entreated, " Bless me, even me also
O my father."

ESAU LOSES THE BLESSING.

It had been wise in Esau to recall to his
mind that he had voluntarily bartered away
his birthright for the mere gratification of his
appetite, and that the loss of the blessing was
the natural sequence of the loss of the birth-
right. But instead of this he throws all the
blame upon his brother, saying his nature was
but the counterpart of his name, and that he
had supplanted him twice. Like most angry
men Esau exceeded the bounds of truth, for
while he acted both foolishly and wickedly in
selling his birthright it was a legitimate
business transaction in which he who sold was
far more guilty than he who made the purchase.
As Esau was in his own opinion unfortunate
rather than criminal, worthy of pity rather
than blame, he appeals to his father's affec-
tion and imploringly enquires, " Has thou not
reserved a blessing for me ?" Though Isaac
was so weak, not to say so sinful as to prefer
Esau to Jacob, his piety was stronger and
deeper than his favoritism, and with perfect
calmness and the utmost candor he replies :

** Behold I have made him thy Lord,
And all his brethren have I given him for servants,
And with com and wine have I sustained him ;
And what shall I do unto thee my son ?"

The state of Esau's mind almost precluded
reflection and without attempting to answer
his father, he pleaded, "Hast thou but one
blessing, my father ! bless me, even me, also, O
my father," and then gave vent to the anguish
of his spirit in cries and tears. The heart of

THE EDOMITES.

St .

Isaac must have yearned over his erring and
wretched son, and no doubt every lineament
of his face as well as the subdued tones of his
voice evinced the depth of his sympathy and
the tenderness of his heart ; yet he dared not,
nor even wished, to do otherwise than obey
the promptings of the spirit, and therefore
said :

*' Behold thy dwelling shall be the fatness of the earth,
And of the dew of heaven from above j
And by thy sword thou shalt live,
And shalt serve thy brother,
And it shall come to pass when thou shalt have the

dominion,
That thou shalt break his yoke from off thy neck."

These prophetic words were far from being
satisfactory to Esau. He saw as every reader
does that they made his hated brother his
lord. They evidently decreased his love to
his father, increased his dislike to his brother
and made him rebel against the decrees of God.
He seems to have left his father's presence
abruptly, and one imagines him walking to
and fro and soliloquizing thus: "I will see
whether I and my children will serve Jacob.
He become a powerful nation, ha ! ha! nothing
can be more easy than to destroy this highly
favored nation in its germ. Jacob is now
childless and childless shall he ever be ; for the
days of mourning for my father are at hand,
the sooner they come the better, and I will
slay my brother Jacob. Nations bow down
to him ! People serve him 1 The dew of heaven,
the fatness of the earth, and corn and wine

ESAU LOSES THE BLESSING.

will add much to the comfort of the dead I
Hard work it will be to break his yoke from
off my neck !"

How vain it is to hope to frustrate the
purposes of the Almighty ! As well might
man attempt to prevent the earth from
turning on its axis or revolving round the
sun. Though the threat against Jacob had
been uttered when Esau supposed there were
none to hear, indeed he may not have been
conscious that his bitter, malicious thoughts
had been clothed in words, yet God so
ordered in His providence that the threat
was heard by one who reported it to his
mother. One seems to see Rebekah as she
listens to the wrathful words of Esau.
Though she feigns to disbelieve them, a tremor
passes over her, her cheeks and lips become
colorless, and great drops of perspiration
stand on her brow. She, doubtless, knew that
Esau was mastered by his passions, instead of
his passions being mastered by him ; and
hence feared that should Jacob be found by
him alone he would be slain, even before the
days of mourning for his father had arrived.

Eebekah's informant having left her, she
calls Jacob to her, and, after assuring herself
that no other human ear could hear, gives him
an unvarnished statement of facts, and
advises him what to do. She exhibits in this
instance all the energy and decision that
might be expected from what has been pre-
viously learned of her character ; and, at the

THE EDOMITES.

same time the most admirable tact in adapt-
ing her counsel to the exigencies of the case.
Jacob must go out of the way of Esau, and
where so well go as to her own family. He
may there find a wife, and thus be rewarded
for his toilsome journey. Esau's wrath would
be as short-lived as it was violent, and then
Jacob would return. But while Rebekah was
drawing this fair picture the thought suddenly
crossed her mind that perchance Jacob would
be slain ere he would be able to leave, and
thus one son would be lost by death, and the
other, becoming a fugitive and a vagabond,
would be worse than lost. Her noble spirit
was for a moment crushed, and she sobbed
rather than said, " Why should I be deprived
of you both in one day ?" These words show
that Rebekah was not devoid of womanly
tenderness. A woman destitute of tenderness
would be an anomaly.

Rebek!>h did not think it for the best to
acquaint her husband with the threat of Esau.
Was her reticence on this subject prompted by
love ? Did she fear the grief it would occa-
sion might hasten his death, or ^ as she afraid
he would reproach her as the cause of the
trouble ? This is one of the many instances
in which it is difficult, if not impossible, to
determine the motives by which one is actu-
ated, and consequently the act cannot be
pronounced either good or bad, the moral
character of any act or course depending
wholly on the intention. We often

ESAU LOSES THE BLESSING.

'■as

err when we attempt to judge of motives.
May not our own motives be so complex as
to baffle analysis even by ourselves ?

Not very long after Rebekah's conversa-
tion with Jacob she went to her husband,
ostensibly with some complaint against her
daughters-in-law, but in reality to obtain his
consent for Jacob to go to Haran. Isaac
would listen patiently to her complaints, and
then endeavor to palliate the offence by
adducing some excuse for the offenders. But
Rebekah would say, " Something of the kind
is an almost every day's occurrence. I am
weary of my life because of the daughters of
Heth ; if Jacob take a wife of the daughters of
Heth, such as these which are of the daughters
of the land, what good shall my life do me ?"
To this Isaac would reply that it was not kind
to reproach Esau for his unfortunate marri-
ages, as he seemed to be under the necessity of
selecting his wives from surrounding nations
or not marrying at all, and would add thai
he thought it ought not to occasion either
regret or surprise if Jacob should follow his
brother's example. This or some similar
remark was, probably, what Rebekah hoped
to call forth ; but, as if the thought had just
occurred to her mind, she would ask ; " How
would it do for Jacob to go to Haran and
marry into my brother's family ? You
remember that Laban is the father of two
daughters who by this time must be mar-
riageable, and one of them has the reputation

■^1

' (
i I

i lit

it
^' ,

I •{

f <]'.

THE EDOMITES.

of being exceedingly fair." Isaac would
scarcely know what to answer. Being very
infirm he would shrirk from the thought of a
separation from either of his sons, but, calling
to mind, as we may presume, the pains and
expense his father had incurred rather than
allow him to marry a Canaanite, and the
annoyances to which both himself and Re-
bekah had been subjected on account of the
impiety of Esau's wives, he finally acquiesced
in the proposal.

Preparations had already been made for
the journey. Such preparations as could be
made for a solitary individual performing a
long journey on foot. Jacob must have been
very scantily supplied even with what would
be considered necessaries, his strength being
insufficient to enable him to carry either
many changes of raiment or supplies for the
recurring wants of many days.

Isaac is neither the first nor the last hus-
band who has been asked to give his consent
to measures which had been determined on
whether his consent was or was not given ;
but he, quite ignorant of what had passed
between Jacob and his mother, called the
former to him and blessed him, and said unto
him, '* Thou shalt not take a wife of the
daughters of Canaan. Arise and go to
Padan-aram, to the house of Bethuel, thy
mother's father, and take thee a wife from
thence of the daughters of Laban thy mother's
brother. And God Almighty bless thee, and

m^^m?^^^

ESAU J.OSE^ THE BLESSING.

make thee fruitful and multiply thee, that
thou mayest be a multitude of people ; and
ffive the blessing of Abraham to thee and to
thy seed with thee ; that thou mayest inherit
the land wherein thou art a stranger which
God gave unto Abraham."

Jacob now sets off on his long tedious
journey, the same journey which had been
made about ninety-five years previously by
Eliezer. The two travellers present a very
strong contrast. One alone, the other with
several attendants. One on foot, the other
riding a camel. One but illy supplied with
either clothing or provisions, the other having
every comfort and convenience. The one, if
he would marry, has no dower but the labor
of his hands, the other has gold and silver,
jewels and raiment for the expected bride.

The question naturally suggests itself:
Why did Jacob travel alone ? Had Isaac,
who had inherited so much wealth, and who
had been so greatly blessed at Gerar, lately
become reduced in circumstances ; or was
Jacob so little loved that none of the servants
cared to accompany him ? He would be likely
to wish for one or more attendants and for a
camel on which to ride, for he was not, as is
sometimes represented, a young man, and
hence full of the ardor and hopefulness and
love of adventure common to youth, but one
on whose head three-quarters of a century
had shed their frosts. One would like to
follow the lonely Jacob and to see him take

! i

■ I

■rm.

r I

THE EDOMITES.

the stones of a certain place and put them for
his pillows. Did he not, before he laid him-
self down to sleep, weep and make supplica-
tion to God ? and was it not in answer to his
earnest prayers that God vouchsafed a glorious
vision — one of the most glorious visions
ever vouchsafed man — and made to him the
far-reaching promises which had been made
to Abraham and Isaac, as well as some of a
special nature suited to his present condition ?
But we must leave Jacob to return to Esau.
We find him, not long after Jacob's departure,,
deliberating as to the best way of making
amends to his father and mother for his
unhappy marriages ; it being quite apparent
to him by the charge given to Jacob that
" the daughters of Canaan pleased not Isaac
his father." Being not only the husband of
two women, but also the father of several
children, he was almost precluded from going
to the distant Padan-aram to seek a wife
among his mother's relatives. There was,
however, one Mahala^^h, or Bashemath, the
daughter of Ishmael, the half-brother of his
fg.ther, against whom he thought there could
noi be the same objection as against his
present wives, and besides, he may have been
attracted by the manner of life practised by
the Ishmaelites, Whether actuatod by one or
both of these reasons, he went and married
her. But it is improbable that either Esau,
or his parents, or his other wives were made
happier by the presence of this Ishmaelitess

ESAU LOSES THE BLESSING.

in the hotisehold. Polygamy is, from its very
nature, so entirely destructive of domestic
bliss, or even peace, that every additional
wife, however amiable she might be, must add
to the discomfort of all concerned. The
reader needs but call to mind Sarah and
Hagar, Rachel and Leah, Peninnah and Han-
nah, to recollect their heart-burnings and
jealousies. If pious women united to pious
men lived in a broil, what would the condi-
tion of the domestic circle be likely to be
when irreligious women were united to an
Esau ? There are probably few Bible readers
who have not wished that they could know
how Rebekah was affected by the departure
of her loved Jacob. May we not suppose
that she gazed on his receding figure till it
could no longer be seen, and that she then
retired to her own. tent and wept ? There is
no record of Rebekah ever shedding a tear;
perhaps she never allowed any one to see her
weep ; but nothing is more certain — strong-
minded and intensely active as she was — than
that she sometimes wept. Tears are women's
heritage. And did not Rebekah on this occa-
sion pray as well as weep? She had, long
years before this, when full of anxiety, gone
to God and poured out her sorrows into his
ear, and had been heard and answered. Would
she not remember the loving-kindness of God
and be thus encouraged to go to him again ?
She must have felt that her sin was very
great, yet did she not plead for forgiveness

1:^'

iih

THE EDOmXES.

through the promised Seed ? Is it not possi-
ble that the great God who multiplies pardons
said to her, " Daughter, go in peace."

Rebekah and Jacob never met again on
earth, and the only record we hear of her
afterwards is the place of her burial — the cave
of Machpelah, and there too, at his own request
was Jacob buried.

Some time within the next twenty years
Esau removed to Mount Seir though still
retaining some interest in his father's property
in Southern Palestine. God intended that
Jacob should return to Canaan with vast
flocks and herds, and so made room for him
by the removal of Esau before Jacob came,
" their riches being more than that they might
dwell together." Nothing, however, was
farther from the mind of Esau than the wish
to make room for his brother. He moved to
Seir because it pleased him to do so ; but why
he chose thence to remove is unknown. It is
possible that his father's piety caused his own
impiety to appear in so unfavorable light as
to lessen his self esteem, and thus render him
unhappy. He did evil and did not wish that
evil should be reproved; or it may be that
the mountainous district of Seir afforded
abundance of game, and as he was skilled in
hunting, that was an inducement for his
removal thither. There is still another
alternative — Aholibamah, one of Esau's wives,
was the daughter of Anah, a Hosite chief, and
as Esau was not very happy among his own

g.wifa^'r'/ • ■ ' ' ""'■"■i"_

ESAU LOSES THE BLESSING.

people, she may have persuaded him to go and
live among hers. But whatever were Esau's
motives the purposes of God as has been
already said were thus accomplished. It was
the will of God that Mount Seir should be the
possession of the descendants of Esau, and Ca-
naan the possession of the descendants ot Jacob.
It was not till the iniquity of the Canaanites
was full that God caused Israel to wage against
them an exterminating war and to appropriate
to themselves the houses and vineyards, the
flocks and herds of that devoted nation ; and
there can be no doubt that when Esau gained
possession of Seir the Hosites had sunken so
low in iniquity that it was necessarv that they
as a nation should be wiped off the xtbce of the
earth.

In the destruction of one nation and in the
placing of another in its stead we see the
sovereignty of the great God. God's sov-
ereignty is indeed one of the truths to which
prominence is given in the Holy Scriptures.
God commands Pharaoh to give freedom to
some millions of serfs ; he refuses to do so, but
the serfs are freed though at the tremendous
cost of ruin on Egypt, misery on her people, and
death to her mighty warriors and her king.
All nations are given into the hands of
Nebuchadnezzar and all attempts to oppose
him are entirely futile. Strong walls are
broken down and stronger hearts are forced
to submit to his rule. God wills that His
temple should be rebuilt, and a heathen ruler

JliM

■W '! ^

THE EDOMITES.

makes the following proclamation : " Thus
eaith Cyrus king of Persia, all the kingdoms,
of the earth hath the Lord God v>f heaven
given me ; and he hath charged me to build
him a house in Jerusalem which is in Judah.
Who is there among you of all his people ?
The Lord his God be with him and let him go
up." Though Cyrus knew not God he was
guided by him. God has said " The earth
shall be filled with the knowledge of the glory
of the Lord as the waters cover the sea ;" and
neither can the wickedness of earth nor the
malice of hell prevent the dawn of that
glorious day. Men may talk of the impos-
sibility of sending the gospel to all peoples^
and of the waning piety of professedly
christian nations, but God's kingdom will
come and His will be done on earth as it is in
heaven. "All nations shall serve him.'*
Heaven and earth may pass away but God's,
Word cannot pass away.

CHAPTER V.

THE LAND OF EDOM.

[HE land which God gave to Esau as a
^possession was the Mount Seir to which
he removed, as has already been stated, not.
very long after Jacob had supplanted him in
reference to his father's blessing. Why this

mms^

THE LAND OF EDOM.

tract of land was called Seir is not certainly
known ; some scholars supposing it to have
been so called from a lan of that name, and
others from the rnggei^ nature of the country.
It may be pretty safely predicated that it took
its name Edom from the removal of Esau or
Edom thither, and from its occupation by his
descendants. This district was also called the
Mount of Esau as in the terrible prophecy of
Obad^-^h. It was wholly mountainous and
was citi ited to the south of Moab. It is
gene -ally supposed to have been but one
hundred miles long by twenty miles in width.
Bozra^n was its ancient capital, and was, it may
be presumed, the birth place of Jobab, one of
Edom's kings. With the name of this city all
Bible readers are familiar from the fact that
it is met with in that very remarkable portion
of scripture, the -sixty-third chapter of the
Prophecy of Isaiah, in which a victory over
the Edomites is typical of the triumphs of the
Lord Jesus Christ over all his enemies.

Sela, better known by its Greek name
Petra, seems to have become its capital, at any
rate it was its chief fortress, and was almost
impregnable ; Elath and Ezion-geber, on the
Red Sea wereEdom's seaports, which, however,
unhappily for her, were often in the hands of
her enemies. The first navy of which we read
was that which was builded at Ezion-geber,
not by Edom — she never had a navy — but by
the powerful Solomon, whose greatness in part
-caused Edom's littleness and kept her little.

h, i*

't i

>;':

THE EDOMITES.

The gleniL' of Edom are said to have been
remarkable for their fertility, but their
limited dimensions rendered it impossible that
any considerable population could be sustained
by the products of the soil ; the inhabitants
may have even thought that they were under
the necessity of having recourse to plunder.
But had they determined to live honestly the
Sovereign of heaven and earth, the Proprietor
of the universe would have spread a table for
them without their trespassing on the rights
of others. It is true alike of nations and
individuals that " Such as turn aside to their
crooked ways, the Lord shall lead them forth
with the workers of iniquity."

Of the mountains of Edom, Hor is the
highest and the most conspicuous. Its height
is said to be about four thousand eight hundred
feet above the Mediterranean, and it is re-
markable for its double top. Close beneath
Mount Hor lies the wonderful Petra, though
neither is visible from the other. But the
mount is chiefly distinguished as being the
place of the death and burial of the first
Levitical high priest. Aaron, the high priest
to whom reference has just been made, had
with his brother Moses and sister Miriam
wandered, at the head of the nation to which
they belonged, in the wilderness thirty-nine
years. The two brothers had lately buried
their sister, a very highly gifted woman at
Kadesh-barnea. There then remained of the
immense host who had left Egypt but four

THE LAND OF EDOM.

persons who, at that time, had arrived at
manhood. Two of the four were to be privi-
leged to see the fulfihnent of their long and
fondly cherished hopes, and enter triumphantly
into the promised land, through the Jordan
that was driven back. The other two, Moses
and Aaron had publicly dishonored God and
their chastisement must be such as should be
known to all the congregation of Israel. By
the command of God Moses and Aaron and
Eleazar, Aaron's eldest son ascend the mount
in the presence of all the people with the
certainty that the high priest would there die.
With what intense interest must Aaron have
been watched by the multitude. Annually,
had he entered, on their behalf, into the most
holy place before the symbol of the divine
presence, and they had stood without praying
and anxiously awaiting his return ; but now
he was to enter into the presence of God
Himself to return to them no more. Let us
look at these men as they ascend the mount.
Is it not probable that Aaron precedes the
other tv70, and that his footstep is firmer and
more elastic than theirs ? One seems to see
the congregation standing with their eyes
steadfastly fixed on Aaron. At one time he
would be hidden, for a moment, by an out
jutting rock and every eye would be strained
to catch the first sight of him as he re-appeared ;
and would they not with one mouth exclaim,
" Thank God ?" But he w^ould grow smaller
and still smaller and dtill smaller till he would

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THE EDOMITES.

be a mere speck, even that speck would cease
to be seen ; and the tinkling of the golden bells
would no longer be heard. The people return
to their tents with the conviction that sin de-
mands punishment ; and while they would
acknowledge the righteousness of God's
judgment they would accuse themselvo'^ ^a
beinor the cause of it. Had not our fathers
and ourselves murmured they would say
Aaron had not sinned, and had he not sinned
he with us would enter Canaan. While these
things are occurring at the base of Hor the
three men would be slowly and silently climb-
ing its heights, and when they reach its castel-
lated summit Eleazar would be more a statue
than a living man. For the first time, perhaps,
in his life he would be conscious of the omni-
presence of God, that in reality He beset him
behind and before and laid His hands upon
him. Aaron would give the signal to be
disrobed. Weak and impulsive as he is by
nature, a follower not a leader among men,
he would be now strong in the strength of
the mighty God, and immovable as the rock
on which he stood. Grieviously as he had
sinned, his is the blessedness of the man whose
transgression is forgiven, and who^e sin is
covered. As morning and evening he had
offered the blood of the slain lamb, may it not
be that he by faith saw the Lamb of God
w^ho in the fullness of time would put away
sin by the sacrifice of himself ? and would not
his faith cause him to sabmit so calmly and

THE LAND OF EDOM.

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even joyfully to the will of God that he would
bear on his countenance the impress of peace
and love and bliss ? But Moses though
scarcely less remarkable for his streni^bh
of resolution than for his meekness would
doubtless be greatly agitated. Had he been
a mere spectator he might have fallen to
the earth ; but he was called to act and earnest
action blunts the edge of feeling. God's
command was Moses' rule of duty, and the
command now was " strip Aaron of his gar-
ments, and put them upon Eleazar his son."
Tenderly and lovingly would Moses take
from off Aaron the golden crown on which
was inscribed "holiness to the Lord," the
linen mitre, the curious girdle of the ephod of
gold, blue, scarlet, purple, and fine twined
linen, the ephod with its onyx stones bearing
the names of the twelve tribes of Israel, the
wonderful breast-plate with twelve oracular
gems and the mysterious Urim and Thum-
mim and the robe of the ephod all of the blue
ornamented with balls and pomegranites of
gold. Eleazar would bow reverently ; and then
it may be his tremulous tenderness giving
place to holy awe he would suffer himself to
be arrayed in the sacerdotal robe. The Scrip-
ture word of Aaron's death is given in
the fewest possible words. "Aaron died
there in the top of the mount." But is it not
lawful to imagi^ J the scene something as
follows : a smile 1/., up the face of Aaron as he
looked on the new high priest and then raising

'^-'..-isaK:"

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THE EDOMITES.

hishands and his eyes toheavenhe triumphant-
ly exclaimed : The Lord is my strength and
my song and he has become my salvation,"
and as he ceased to speak a luminous cloud
overshadowed him, and he was not for God
had taken him. The temple which was once
the house of the worshipper was all that re-
mained on earth.

CHAPTER VI.

ESAU'S INTERVIEW WITH JACOB AT THE

JAEBOK.

iHE life of Jacob at Padan-aram had not
been all sunshine. The conduct of
his father-in-law had never been remarkable
for its straightforwardness, bnt latterly it had
become even more crooked than ever ; and it
was evident to Jacob that he was losing his
favor. Jacob was perplexed, and in his per-
plexity he doubtless went to God in prayer —
all believers do that — and the Lord told him
to return to his own country and promised to
be with him. In obedience to this command
in a short time he, with his wives and chil-
dren, flocks and herds, was going Canaanward.
Esau probably intended, on the demise of his
father, to return to Canaan himself, and hence
he no sooner heard of the migrating family
than he determined to intercept them. For

ESAU'S INTERVIEW WITH JACOB.

this purpose he armed four hundred of his
adherents, and went to meet them, intending
either to murder his brother and his family,
or make them his prisoners, and thus gain
possession of the flocks and herds. Of the
intentions of Esau Jacob was wholly igno-
rant, but, remembering the feud which existed
before he left the parental roof, he thought it
but prudent to send a deputation to his
brother. The messengers were instructed to
address Esau as follows : " Thy servant Jacob
saith thus, I have sojourned with Laban, and
stayed there until now ; and I have oxen and
and asses, flocks and herds, men-servants and
women-servants ; and I have sent to tell my
lord that I may find grace in thy sight." The
more closely we examine this message the
more conciliatory it is seen to be. He calls
himself a servant and Esau his lord. He was
a mere sojourner while with Laban, his time,
however, had not been unemployed ; on the
contrary, he had amassed considerable wealth
— he knew that would be likely to commend
him to his brother's favor — and he wished for
Esau's friendship and esteem. The message
was, no doubt, faithfully delivered, but the
answer was evidently very unsatisfactory, for
the messengers returned in haste, and reported
that Esau, with a large band of warriors, was
coming to meet them. One imagines that a
panic would seize the whole caravan. One
would propose reiurning to Padan-aram with
all possible speed, another to take refuge in

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III

THE EDOMITES.

the first ravine that could be found, and
another still to arm themselves as best they
could and sell their lives at the dearest pos-
sible rate. The children would cry and the
women weep, and Jacob himself was greatly
distressed. He would begin to question
whether the voice which bade him return to
Canaan was indeed the voice of God. If God
was with him would he be exposed to this
danger ? What if his beloved Joseph should
be slain before his eyes, or what would be
even worse, be carried captive! How could
he endure to see the beautiful Rachel become
the property of another ! Even Leah, the
tender-eyed Leah, whom he had married, not
from choice but necessity, would be dear to
him now ; and the thought that she who had
borne srven should be either slain or made a
prisoner stings him almost to madness. But
Jacob, though tortured with doubts and fears,
is still a believer, and the believer ah /ays
finds a refuge in God. He is a stronghold in
the day of trouble. Jacob goes to God, and
speaks to him as his covenant God : " 0 God
of my father Abraham and God of my father
Isaac." He pleads the promise : " I will deal
well with thee." He acknowledges his
unworthiness : " I am not worthy of all the
mercies and of all the truth which thou hast
showed unto thy servant;" prays for the
safety of his family: "Deliver me, I pray
thee, from the hand of my brother, from the
hand of Esau ; for I fear him lest he will

ESAU'S INTERVIEW WITH JACOB.

come and smite me, and the mother with the
children ;" and again pleads God's promises :
" Thou saidest I will surely do thee good, and
make thy seed as the sand of the sea which
cannot be numbered for multilude." There
was, I think, no assurance given Jacob that
his prayer was accepted. But, whether hope
or fear predominated, he acted prudently and
wisely. He neither sank into despair on
account of the threatening danger, nor ne-
glected the use of means because God had
promised to be with him. He used his utmost
efforts to appease the wrath ot his brother,
arranged for the safety of his family — or at
least for a part of it — in case that wrath could
not be appeased, and put his hope and confi-
dence entirely in God.

Esau met his brother not far from the
Jabbok ; and how different the meeting from
that which he had anticipated 1 He meets
five droves of animals — in all five hundred
and eighty — and on asking the drivers to
whom they belonged and whether they were
going, received on each occasion the same
strangely kind answer : " They be thy ser-
vant Jacob's ; it is a present to my lord
Esau; and behold also he is behind us."
Esau would be at first suspicious. He would
think it another act of subtlety in the subtle
Jacob ; but his suspicion would give place to
surprise, and surprise to amazement, and finally
every other feeling would be displaced by ten-
derness. " Can it be possible," he would

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exclaim, " that 0 acub, 80 far from preparing
to resist me or endeavoring to escape, sends
me this munificent present, acknowledges me
his lord, and comes to throw himself upon
my mercy ? Why really he yields to me
the supremacy due to my birth, and what
more can I ask or even desire ?" While Esau
is thus soliloquizing he sees Jacob approach-
ing, but oh ! how changed. For twenty
years he had endured the frost by night
and the sun's heat by day, a,nd the previ-
ous night had not only been an entirely
sleepless one, but, during the hours he had
had a most ri^markable and mysterious
contest with Omnipotence. Up to that time
such an event had never occurred ; down
to the present age the instance is without a
parallel. Jacob had pleaded his cause before
God, he had filled his mouth with arguments,
but an answer was withheld. Yet was he not
^ indone without God's aid ? In this extremity
he caused all his family to pass over the Jabbok
that he might be alone with God. He is on his
knees engaged in earnest prayer when sudden-
ly he is seized by One who seems to be an
enemy, who would, not only interrupt his
devotions, but also throw him to the earth ;
and Jacob endeavors to gain some advantage
over his assailant, w^hom he soon perceives is
no other than the mighty God ; and, hence, to
lose his hold of him would be to lose all hope.
His agonized efforts are but the counterpart
of his agonized feelings. The assailant would

ESAU S INT£RV1E^>^ FITH JArOB.

at once have been the vicfc r hi,d he not im-
parted the strength agai rjt which he com-
batted. Had he not, as L ;sl' puts it, ''fought
for Jacob with his right hand while he fought
against him with his left." The strength
with which Jacob sustained the contest with
the Ahnighty was not the strength of bones
and sinews, nor was the non-prevalence of the
Angel — thus the great God is here designated
— anything else than his will not to withstand
the power of unwavering faith, pleading his
own promises. That Jacob might be humble
though victorious, God by a touch dislocated
his thigh, leaving him no alternative but
to allow himself to be vanquished or to
cling to his combatant v/ith all his might.
"Let me go," says the righty God, which
was as much as to say, " I cannot go without
your consent." Thv:, wor/ii Jacob, strong in
the strength of the -^i^g^ /y God, replies ; " I
will not let thee •.,') unless thou bless me."
God yields to the prv/er he ho-d imparted to
his servant and blessc ' him. This tremen-
dous struggle left, no doubt, such an impression
on Jacob's face as could not fail to strike the
beholder. Was not the tabernacle «?o rent
that the indweller could be seen ; the casket
so shattered that through it the jewel sbcne ?
P]sau would look on Jacob with astonish-
ment mingled with awe : and would be pained
as he saw him prostrate himself again and
again oefore him, till at length he tell at his
feet. He would be entiuly subdued. The

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THE EDOMITES.

stern features of the old warrior would relax
and be expressive of more than woman's
tenderness. In vain would he recall to mind
that he was surrounded by a band of soldiers
who had left their homes with the expectation
of becoming the possessors of the whole
caravan ; and that they might accuse him of
pusillanimity. They had long placed in him
the most unbounded confidei'ce, and he was
unwilling to forfeit that confidence ; they had
been true to him in many a dangerous enter-
prise, and carried on their persons many
honorable scars, and they are now anxiously
awaiting the command to seize the company.
But what could Esau do ? His heart was as
wax before the fire. He would no longer see
in Jacob the supplanter, nor remember that
he had taken advantage of his hunger and
fatigue to obtain his birthright ; and of his
father's blindness to appropriate to himself
the blessing. All past broils would be for-
gotten and he would see in him only the twin
brother who had been nourished at the same
breast, led by the same tender hand, and
instructed by the same gentle voice. For-
merly his heart, it may be, was filled with
bitterness against God because he had declared
even before his birth that he should serve his
younger brother ; but now he would have so
deep a sense of God's right of sovereignty over
all the creatures he had made that even
rebellious thought was subdued ; and he would
bless God that there was nothincf in his decrees

ESAU S INTERVIEW WITH JACOB.

to exclude him from eternal blessedness. Esau
dropped his weapons of war, " ran to meet
Jacob, and embraced him, and fell on his neck
and kissed him, and they wept ;" and for some
time they could do nothing but weep for their
hearts were too full for words. Formerly
each thought of the other s wrong-doings, now
each would think of his own. Never even in
the days of their childhood had they loved each
other as they would love now. They would
be astonished that there should ever have
been any alienation of feeling between them
and resolve to be firm friends the remainder
of their lives.

While the brothers were in each other's
arms the wives and children of Jacob drew
near and bowed themselves before Esau. Is
it not presumable that the fair face of Rachel
brought that of Esau's mother before him, and
awakened more tender emotions toward her
then he had previously experienced ? He had
never had very fervent love for his mother
and for the lack he had thought himself
excusable ; but he would think differently
now. He would not be at all surprized that
his moth or had preferred Jacob to himself,
but surprised, rather, that his father had not
shared in that preference. Formerly he had
blamed every body but himself for his mis-
fortunes, now he would blame himself and
himself only. Had not old things with him
passed away and had not all things become
new ? The tree is known by its fruits, and

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THE EDOMITES.

the good tree at once began to produce good
fruit. The brothers now become rivals in
generosity, Esau is unw:lling to accept his
brother s present, and will not consent to do
so till he is convined that its acceptance will
give his brother pleasure and in return wishes
to accompany him, with his men to Canaan.
This kind offer Jacob with much politeness
declines. Esau then asks to be allowed to
send a sufficient number of men to insure the
safety of the family. But Jacob feeling that
he is encompased with God's host has no
apprehension of danger and replies : " What
needeth it ? Let me find grace in the right of
my Lord." Esau withdrew his request ; and
after obtaining a promise that Jacob would at
some future time visit him, "returned that
day on his way to Seir." There is no record
of this visit but this is not proof that it was
never made. It is presumable that Jacob did
visit Esau ; and that the friendship commenced
at the fords of the Jabbok was then so firmly
cemented that it was never afterwards broken.
After the lapse of another twenty years
we meet with the two brothers together again.
They are at Hebron, a city about twenty
miles to the south of Jerusalem, picturesquely
situated in a narrow valley surrounded by
rocky hills. But the scenery, charming as it
was, would be scarcely noticed by these men ;
for they are carrying with them the lifeless
body of thvdr father. With measured tread
they enterMackpelah's cave, where had already

ESAU'S INTERVIEW WITH JACOB.

been deposi^'^:^ the remains of the beautiful
Sarah, and the faithful Abraham; and at a
comparatively recent date, their own mother,
the fair Rebekah. They would lay the body
of their father in its final resting place and
sitting down on the dank earth cry, "my
father, oh my father," and their voices would
at times be lost in the wild shrieks of Leah
and her companions.

The extreme brevity of this part of the
scripture narrative renders it impossible for
one to ascertain what length of time Esau, on
this occasion passed in Canaan. Is it not
reasonable to suppose that Jacob sent for him
as soon as he perceived that Isaac was drawing
near to death ? and that they together stood
by the bed of the dying saint, and listened to
the last words which fell from his lips ? No
plotting now ; neither would have any desire
to interfere with the rights of the other — for
love to God is wholly incompatible with hatred
to man they cannot co-exist — but on the con-
trary each would be anxious to occupy the
position, to fill the niche designed him by the
great God.

The days of mourning for Isaac being
ended Esau returned to his mountain home
and thus yielded to Jacob his fathe/s tents,
and wells, and perchance all his flocks and
herds, Jacob must have been by this time a
very wealthy man, but he was by no means
exempt from trials. Not many years had
lapsed aijac^ the death of his loved and loving

.■■.-i.-),.A'...'jvmiij

THE EDOMITES.

Rachel and the anguish of her last hours would
be ever before him ; and in vain would he
endeavor to erase the remembrance of it from
his mind bychangingthenameofthemotherless
boy from Ben-oni to Benjamin. But much
as Jacob mourned for Ilachel, he mourned still
more for Joseph, her first-born and his favorite
son. He had suddenly disappeared and there
were reasons for believing that he had become
a prey to wild beasts. There is a deep pathos
in the words, " I will go down into the grave
unto my son mourning." The scene at Peniel
changed Jacob's nature scarcely less than his
name. He had been a believer for at least
twenty years previously ; but he was then
brought nearer to God than ever before.
From that event he ceased to be crafty, subtle
and underhanded, and was truthful, honest,
straightforward and sincere. It is evident
that from that time he would rather fail of
an end, however desirable, than accomplish it
by unfair means, and the severe trials through
which he passed are an illustration of the
words uttered by our adorable Redeemer many
hundreds of years afterwards : " Every branch
that beareth fruit he purgeth it that it may
bring forth more fruit."

We never meet with Esau after the burial
of Isaac ; and he, alas, is one of the many
relative to whose eternal state we cannot
speak with certainty. He sold his birthright
and hence is designated by the spirit of truth,
"Profane Esau." He also meditated the

ESAU S INTERVIEW WITH JACOB.

murder of his brother, and afterwards the
murder or tlie carrying oft' captive of his
brother and his family. But do not his con-
duct at the Jabbok, the uninterrupted
friendship of twenty years, his assisting at
the burial of his father, and then returning
gently to Seir, furnish presumptive evidence
that he was a new man ? " Do men gather
grapes of thorns or fi^'s of thistles ?"

While there is a ];)0^;:,ibility, if not a prob-
bability that Esau late in life became a
believer, his long course of sin had its natural
effect on his descendants. No man can destroy
the effect of the influence he has exerted
however much he may wish to do so. Man-
asseh was pardoned, but his evil example had
so thoroughly contaminated his subjects that
long years after his decease God punished
them for sins of which they might never have
been guilty had that king never lived ; and
during the. long series of years in which Esau
lived in rebellion against God, the nation of
which he was the head became so permeated
with iniquity that they never ceased to do
evil and learned to do well. As all influence
others, and cannot avoid infl^uencing others, is
not piety, earnest sincere piety, the truest
philanthropy ?

Let no one expect to be finally saved though
he continues in sin because a Manasseh or an
Esau was converted late in life. It is most
irrational for one to do that of which he
means to repent. Besides, one may be sud-

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THE EDOMITES.

111

denly summoned to appear before the Judge ;
or time for repentance may be given and yet
repentance not granted. The consciousness
that death is near may occasion not repentance
but remorse. The power to love God may be
entirely lost. " Whosoever committeth sin is
the servant of sin ;" and sin is the mast cruel
and imperious of all masters. "The wages
of sin is death." Reader, are you serving this
Master ? will you work for such wages ? Stop
and think.

%i4

CHAPTER VIL

THE HORITES.

^HE renowned conqueror, of whom it is
said that he never tasted bread, and
who boasted that the grass never grew where
his horse had set his foot, has been designated
"tie scourge of God." Might he not have
been more fitly denominated God's sword ?
there being Scripture authority for such an
appellation. Nimrod is the first sword of
God in human form with whom we meet on
the historic page, and next in order is Che-
dorlaomer, (ravager of the west). Little do
such men think when straining every nerve
in order to gratify their love of domination and
lust of power, that they are carrying out the
purposes of the Almighty, and should they

THE HORITES.

wish to go further than would be ultimately
for the extension of his glory, he would put
hooks into their jaws and cause them to
return. Chedorlaomer was one of the Lord's
swords in the twentieth century before the
birth of Christ. We first meet him with
three other kings or sheiks, accompanied by a
band of warriors, spreading terror and deso-
lation wherever they go. For the ravages
committed in some states they had a reasonable
pretext ; in others their only right was their
might. Among the latter the Horites are
probably to be classed. They were the ori-
ginal inhabitants of Mount Seir, but of them
very little is known. Even the origin of
their name is otfc:cure, some supposing it to
have been derived from the name of one of
their early ancestors, Hori, and others from
their habits as cave-dwellers. They were of
Hamite blood, on whom the fearful curse
rested — "a servant of servants unto his
brethren."

Caves, as is well known, were among the
first human habitations, and the country of
the Horites afforded peculiar facilities for this
kind of dwelling. The Horites may have
lacked skill to erect houses, and had they
possessed skill they might not have used it
for that purpose, as in their country it was
much easier to excavate than to build. There
is no proof that thef cultivated the earth,
but they kept flocks and herds which supplied
them for the most part with food and clothing.

■■ th

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THE EDOMITES.

1 i! i:

Chedorlaomer by his invasion appears to have
reduced them to the greatest extremity.
When the patriarch Job would convince his
friends that the calamities which had befallen
him were absolutely unprecedented, really
intolerable, he refers to this down-trodden,
half-civilized race, "fleeing into the wilder-
ness," living "in caves of the earth and in
the rocks," digging for roots to satisfy the
pangs of hunger, and obtaining even these by
stealth ; yet they, even they, the abhorrest of
all others, abhor him. They, the most
wretched of the sons of wretchedness, the
vilest of the vile, even they dare treat ?iim
with disrespect.

Though the Horites were reduced by
Chedorlaomer to the extremest poverty they
retained their independence, and were gov-
erned by their own dukes or sheiks. The
names of seven of these sheiks have been
handed down to us. These are as follow:
Lotan, Shobal, Zibeon, Anah, Dishon, Ezer,
and Dishan. These men were the sons of
Seir, and possessed the chieftainships simul-
taneously in difFereiifc parts of the country.
The occupation of Anah, a chieftain, gives us
a hint as to the manner in which the mag-
nates among this people lived. He fed the
asses of Zibeon, his father. If, as some
among thp learned suppose, the word trans-
lated " mules " in the twenty-fourth verse of
the thirty-sixth chapter of Genesis should
have been translated warm springs, Anah,

THE HORITES.

the Horite, may have been the first to discover
that some of the lower animals are endowed
with the faculty of snuffing moisture in the
air and thus finding latent waters.

God's judgments are unsearchable, and his
ways past finding out ; and it was His
righteous will that the Horites should not
only lose their property but their indepen-
dence also ; and that they finally as a nation
should become extinct. Though we are told
that the children of Edom destroyed the
Horites, it is by no means certain that there
was not at all times a friendly feeling existing
between the Edomites and some of the
Horites. It is quite conceivable that wars
occurred between the different clans of the
last-named people, and that Esau was called
upon to aid one clan in the destruction of
another, and still another, till they became
too weak to make any resistance. It may,
indeed, have been that they never wished to
to be rid of the Edomites, for, finding it
easier than it was formerly to dispose of their
daughters in marriage, and to avenge them-
selves on their enemies, they would think
their condition bettered by the presence of
the newcomers.

While the Horites as a people became
extinct, some of the race were continued by
intermarriages with the people of Edom.
Indeed, the marriage- of Esau with the
daughter of Anah may have been the begin-
ning of the acquaintance between these

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THE EDOMITES.

peoples. If it were allowable to draw on the
imagination, one might suppose that Esau, in
his occupation as a hunter, wandered into
Seir, and meeting with Anah in charge of his
flocks, was invited to enter his subterraneous
dwelling and partake of his hospitality ; and
that there he made the acquaintance of
Anah's daughter. One would imagine her
young and beautiful, dressed in a robe of fur,
with hair hanging in luxuriant tresses about
a slender neck, and that, with a cromlech for a
table, and shells and leaves for dishes, she took
venison, milk and fruit and courteously served
her father's guest. Under these circumstances
he would be little inclined to eat, even though
he had fasted many long hours. May we not
suppose that Esau was charmed with the
weird landscape of fertile dells, and jagged
rocks, and cliffs with sharp serrated edges;
aLd that, meeting with a fair girl in circum-
stances so entirely new, he nearly lost self-
consciousness ? And may it not be that ha
never left Seir till Aholibamah consented to
go with him to his paternal home ? But
whether this supposition' be correct or not, we
learn from the sacred record that Aholibamah
was one of the women who most unfortunately
caused Rebekah to be weary of her life.

Eliphaz. the eldest son of Esau, followed
his father's example in marrying a Horite
wife. Her name was Tinna, and she was a
descendant of Seir. Tinna became the mother
of five sons, the eldest of whom, Teman, was

THE HORITES.

so considerable a personage that from him a
tract of country took its name. The people
who resided there were proverbial for th^ir
wisdom. " Is wisdom no more in Teman V*
inquires the inspired Jeremiah, as if it would
certainly be found there if the land had not
become depopulated. The reader will readily
call to mind Eliphaz, the Temanite, who leads
in the interesting discussion with the affiliated
Job on the providences of God. Though
against him, as well as against Bildad and
Zophar, the charge is brought that he had not
spoken of God the thing which was right,
yf '; for depth of thought and beauty of dic-
tion his speeches are almost without a
parallel. Is it possible for any one to read
his description of a specter without a tremor ?
The gloaming, the undiscernible form, the
passing and the standing still, the silence and
the voice, and the solemn and impressive
words uttered, alike rivet the attention and
permeate the soul till all one's bones are made
to shake, and the hair of one's flesh stands up.
It is probable that when Esau removed to
Seir he had but five sons, yet, as he had
daughters and grandchildren, his descendants
may have been numerous, and, like his pater-
nal grandfather, h*e had hundreds of retainers,
the migrating party might, therefore, have
been both large and powerful.

Anah had but one son, and it is possible
that at his death a part of his possessions
fell to his daughter, the wife of Esau. Is it

THE r:>OMITES.

not presumable that it was thus he acquired
his first real estate in his new home ? May
not Eliphaz, too, have acquired property in
Seir through his wife ? This conjecture is
the more probable from the fact that names
of districts are identical with the names of
these women.

CHAPTER VIII.

THE DUKEDOMS AND THE EARLY KINGDOM OF

EDOM.

MT is probable that the Edomites were
governed by dukes several centuries after
their removal to Seir ; for not only are the
names of many of these dukes recorded, but
we hear the Israelites after their miraculous
passage over the Red Sea exultingly exclaim,
*' The dukes of Edom shall bo afraid."

It has been well said by Bush tl.at " the
English word ' duke ' must not here be taken
as implying any thing like the order of noblity
with which in modern times, we usually
associate it, but rather in the sense of the Latin
dux, leader, from which duke is derived:"
We have seen one of the Horite dukes taking
the care of a herd of asses, and there is a
probability that the dukes or shieks of Edom
engaged in like humble employments. The
Edomites, too, like Seir's original inhabitants,

THE EARLY KINGDOM OF EDOM.

became troglodites, and even excav8,ted rather
than builded where they lived, in Southern
r^lestine. The Nabathians were the lirst
buiider'i in the land of Edoni.

We are not forbidden to hope that many
of the Edomites were worshippers of the true
God, but as a people they were idolators ; and
in accordance with the custom of most ancient
nations, they adopted the gods of the country
to which they had come. It is a remarkable
fact tha!: one of the kings of Judah carried
the gods of Seir to his own country and set
them up to be his gods.

►Sometime during the forty years that
Israel wandered in the wilderness the ducal
or patriarchal government in Edom gave
place to the monarchical, or the latter was
grafted on the former ; for when the Israel-
ites would pace the land of Edom t^ey
presented their request to the king of
that country^ The message sent by Israel
was well calculated to enlist the sympathies
of the people of Edom. Reference is made to
the relation existing between the two peoples,
to the long and distressing bondage of Israel
in Egypt ; to their groans and cries to God ;
to His interference on their behalf ; to their
long and toilsome journey ; and to their desire
to pass through the country simply to pass
through in the king's highway; and they
promised that if they or their cattle should
drink of the water of the wells for it payment
should be made. This request \/as most per-

!- ^1

■I.

100

THE EDOMITES.

emptorally denied, and when the Israelites
ventured to make a very respectful remon-
strance, the answer was a host of armed men
prepared to resist by the sword an entrance
into their country. That the Edomites should
dare oppose six hundred thousand men shews
that they were either very strong or very
brave ; but, perchance, theirs was the bravery
of despair. An engagement would no doubt
have ensued had not the great God forbidden
his people to meddle with them.

From this time till the reign of Saul, the
son of Kish — a period of about four hundred
years — all the information that we have
relative to this people is contained in nine
verses of the thirty-sixth chapter of Genesis
and the parallel passage in Chronicles. A
great deal of matter is, however, contained in
this brief passage. The names of eight kings
are given, and the names of the cities to
which they severally belonged ; and the names
of the fathers of four of these kings. We also
learn that one of them was a foreigner, and
that another successfully warred against the
Midianites in the fields of Moab; and of
another still we are told the names both of
his wife and his mother-in-law. Why, one
naturally asks were the names of these women
recorded ? Had they become notnd for some
exploit ? or was Hatred and Israeli tish woman
who had been carried a captive into Edom ;
and did the sacred historian hence infer that
those for whose benefit he more particularly

THE EARLY KINGDOM OF EDOM.

101

wrote, would be interested in the fact that
her daughter had been raised to so elevated a
position ?

The reigns of the eight kings may have
extended over the whole four hundred years ;
for though it would be absurd to suppose
that the average length of their reign was a
half century, there probably were as many
interregnums as reigns. The monarchy was
evidently elective, and as all, or nearly all men
seek for sovereign power but those who know
it is unattainable, it may be presumed that on
the demise of each king there were many
aspiranU to the crown, and much time would
elapse if not much blood be shed before the
authority of any one would be firmly estab-
lished. From the record the inference may
be drawn that none of the kings were deposed
or met with violent deaths.

Some have entertained the opinion that
Bela, the son of Beor, was the king who
refused Israel a passage through Edom and
that he was identical with Balaam, the son of
Beor, the poet, prophet, and diviner, who,
loving the wages of unrighteousness, wished
to curse the Israelites and yet most emphati-
cally blessed them. In like manner Joab has
been by some writers thought to be no other
than the Job who was so remarkable for his
piety and the afflictions he endured ; whose
professed comforters were tormenters, and
whose story will be read with interest as long
as there are minds that think, and hearts that
feel.

"ft

102

THE EDOMITES.

The last named in this list of kings was
quite probably, an ancestor of the little prince
Haclad who fled for his life during those
terrible months in which the sword of the in-
vincible Joab drank Edom's richest blood.

CHAPTER IX.

DOEQ.

iHE Edomites are reckoned among the
enemies of Saul over whom he was;
victorious. Of Doeg, the Edomite, we know
nothing till we find him in the land of the
conqueror of his people. With truly good
men the love of country is often stronger
than the love of life. It was not thus with
Doeg. He was not good, nor patriotic. The
most important of all questions to his mind,
evidently was, "How can I most effectively
serve myself ?" This he evidently concluded
could best be done by going to the land of
Israel and offering his services to the enemy
of his country. It is evident that his services
were accepted for we find him chief of the
herdsmen of Saul. In that innocent and
lucrative employment he might have remained
till the end of his life, but for a seeming ac-
cident. Saul, as is well known, became
acquainted with the fact that David, the son
of Jesse, was destined to succeed him on the

DOEO.

103

throne ; and consequently pursued him with
the most implacable hate, often obliging him to
flee in order to save his lite. On one of these
occasions David called at Not — a city belong-
ing to the priests, situated on an eminence
near Jerusalem, and where the tabernacle was
then stationed — and asked Ahimelech for
bread. The priests, surprised that the king's
son-in-law should be travelling without a
iSuitable retinue, asked for an explanation.
David gave an answer which satisfied the
priest, but which must have been most unsat-
isfactory to himself. Circumstances may
palliate a lie but can never render it justifiable.
The day was the Sabbath, on each return of
which, the high priest removed from the gold-
plated table — where it had been lying seven
days — the twelve loaves called the Shew or
presence bread, and laid twelve hot loaves in
their places. Ahimelech seems to have been
carrying these loaves when he was met by
David, and although he wished much to oblige
him, he had doubts as to the propriety of the
act, as the law required that that bread should
be eaten by the priests. Ahimelech, however,
being convinced that it was riorht in that
emergency, gave David and his attendants the
hallowed loaves. Food, however, was not
David's only want ; for, being obliged to flee
with the utmost haste he was not well armed ;
so he asked Ahimelech if he could provide him
with sword or spear, and was told that the
only one there was that which was formerly

I' r-^'

■ ■!fi

'ill

l^ft^'

^^gH^'.^

104r

THE EDOMITES,

owned by Goliath of Gath. On the mention
of that sword the scene of the ever memorable
day on which ii was won would, we may
suppose, rise as a panorama before the mind
of David. He would see the valley of Elah
spread out before him. On one side would
seem to stand the army of Israel, and on the
other the army of the Philistines from amon^
whom would stride forth the great Goliath.
He is arrayed in a coat of mail of glistening
brass and he has a helmet on his head, a target
between his shoulders, and on his legs greaves
of the same strong, shining metal. His head
reaches the clouds, the earth quivers under his
footstep, his voice is as the lion's roar, and he
utters the imperious boast : " I defy the armies
of Israel this day, give me a man that we may
fight together." David in imagination again
takes a stone from his scrip, places it in his
sling, and causes it to sink into the giant's fore-
head ; Goliath reels, a moment more and he lies
prostrate on the earth. David seems to stand
on the carcass, draws the giant's sword from its
si eath and dissevers the head from the body.
He seems to see the Philistines flee and to
hear the triumphant shouts of Israel. His
heart is strengthened. He believes that God
who gave him the victory over Goliath will
ultimately make him the victor over all his
enemies, and he exultingly exclaims, " Give
me the sword of Goliath, there is none like
that." Evidently, David had supposed that
no one had heard the conversation between

DOEa

105

the priest and himself, but just as he was
about oO leave the courts of the tabernacle* he
saw Doeg the Edoinite. David is alarmed
lest some evil come to the priest Brave
men are always unwilling to risk the safety
of others. When themselves only are con-
cerned they shrink at no danger ; but when
others might be the sufferers, they are timid
as women. David is no stranger to the intense
selfishness of Doeg's character. He knows
that he would stoop to anything by which he
might ingratiate himself still further into the
favor of the king ; that he would think nothing
mean by which he could obtain riches or raise
his social position ; nothing cruel whieh does
not interfere with his individual rights or
-cause his precious self to suffer. David was
also acquainted with the impulsive, rash re-
vengeful character of Saul; and knew, but
too well that Ahimilech would experience
little mercy should his conduct be reported
But what could he do ? Himself a fugitive
he was powerless to aid others.

Some time after the interview between
David and Ahimelech Saul learned that David
with a band of men was living within the
limits of his kingdom, and hence inferred that
he was befriended by some of his servants.
When he received the intelligence he was
standing under a wide-spreading tree sur-
rouned by some hundreds of men, himself, the
handsomest, tallest, grandest, of 'hem all, the
very perfection of manly beauty ; but his words

•I

106

THE EDOMITES.

ij w

ii i

li. (I

are in strange contrast with his appearance,
being weak, puerile, pitiable, contemptible:
" Will the son of Jesse, give everyone of you
fields and vineyards, and make you all captains
of hundreds and captains of thousands ; that
all of you have conspired against m^, and
there is none that sheweth me that my son
has made a league with the son of Jesse, and
there is none of you that is sorry for me or
sheweth unto me that my son hath stirred up
my servant against me as at this day ?"

Doeg, it may be presumed, had long waited
for an opportunity to manifest his zeal for
the king his master, and now that it had
occurred he was resolved to improve it irres-
pective of its costs to others. He would re-
member the dreary day he had passed in the
court of the tabernacle. To iihe truly pious
man it would have been a rich privilege, to
him a disagreeable duty. The burning of
sacrifice, the sprinkling of blood, and the rising
clouds of incense would alike be regarded with
indifference. He it may be, had led thither a
bullock, or a ram, to be offered as a sacrifice
by the godly Jonathan ; and was obliged to
remain there till the offerer came, " detained
before the Lord.*' How wearisome the hours I
But now he would think the detention most
fortunate. " I saw," said he " The son of Jesse
coming to Nob, to Ahimelech the son of
Ahitub, and he enquired of the Lord for him
and gave him victuals, and gave him the sword
of Goliath the Philistine." "There was no

DOEa

107

good reason why Doeg should at all mention
Ahimeleeh*s conduct which he knew did not
proceed from malice ; but if he must report it,
he should have declared how Ahimelech was'
imposed upon by David, and that he intended
to show respect to Saul in that very action, but
on the contrary he spoke as if David came to
take Ahimelech's adviee.about his subsequent
proceedings, and as if Ahimelech was joined
with David in a conspiracy against Saul ;
though nothing could be more contrary to the
truth than this insinuation. Doeg, therefore,
slandered Ahimelech and bare false witness
against him, though the general charges ad-
duced accorded with facts."* One imagines
that when Saul heard the words of Doeg that
he turned deadly pale, his limbs trembled, his
lips and chin quivered, and his eyes flashed
fire ; and that he gave utterance to something
like the following words : " What sacrilege 1
Dared he thus dispose of hallowed bread !
would he presume to give away that wonder-
ful trophy taken from the Philistine giants.
I was so solicitous for God's honor that I
would not keep it in my own palace ; but
caused it to be carefully wrapped and deposited
by the holy ephod, in the tabernacle. But
was it safe there ? No. He who ought to
have preserved it at the risk of his life, gave
it to one who aims at subverting my govern-
ment and placing my crown upon his own
head. The son of Jesse wishes to remind my

* Scott.

II: f

108

THE .EDOMITES.

subjects that he killed Goliath and to hear the
women again sing " Saul hath slain his thou-
sands and David his ten thousands." As soon
as Saul's paroxism of rage was over he sent
for Ahimelech and all the other priests then
residing at Nob. They came at his bidding
in all eighty -five persons ; and in their sacer-
dotal robes presented themselves before him.
The king then addressing Ahimelech said:
" Why have ye conspired against me, thou and
the son of Jesse, in that thou hast given him
bread and a sword, and hast enquired of God
for him, that he should rise against me, to lie
in wait as at this day ?" The good Ahimelech
who had not been guilty of any distoyalty to
his king, or impiety toward God, was surprised
at the accusation. He did not wish to deny
that he had aided David, and he had supposed
that in doing so he had also served Saul.
" Who " he ingenuously enquires, " is so faith-
ful among all thy servants as David, which is
the king's son-in-law and goeth at thy bidding,
and is honorable in thine house." And then
in his astonishment at being censured for
inquiring of the Lord for him, he adds, " Did
I then begin to enquire of the Lord for him ?
be it far from me ; let not the king impute
any thing unto his servant, nor to all the
house of my father; for thy servant knew
nothing of all this less or more." These are
the words of an innocent, kind hearted judi-
cious. God-fearing man, who while endeavor-
ing to exculpate himself is careful not to

if
1 iiii

DOEG.

109

criminate David. To Saul's attendants it was
evident that Ahimelech had been guily of no
wrong, and it would also have been evident to
Saul had he not degenerated since he was
made king. He had so long and so persistently
turned aside to his wicked ways, that he now
had no clear perception of right ; he had so
long violated the dictates of his conscience
that now conscience was for the most part
silent. The evil spirit from the Lord came
upon him, and he was deaf to reason, insensible
to pity. Heeding not the apology of
Ahimelech, he said to the footmen who stood
about him : " Turn and slay the priests of the
Lord." But these footmen knowing that the
priests were innocent, nobly dared to disobey
the king, rather than sin against God and
their own consciences. Saul seeing that his
orders were not executed, said to Doeg:
** Turn thou and fall upon the priests." Doeg
w^aited not for a second bidding. True they
had been convicted of no crime, on them the
sacred oil had been poured and they were
devoted to the service of God. But what
mattered that to him ? Did it not give him
the better opportunity to manifest his zeal
for the king ? and would he n^ b be likely to
receive the richer reward ? Doeg, one imagines
to have been as remarkable for his physical
strength as for the weakness of his moral
principles, and his great strength may have
caused him the more willingly to undertake
the slaughter. He would expect resistance

1,1

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illP

Hi i

110

THE EDOMITES.

submi

for that man would calmly
slain because their sovereign had so ordered,
was something wholly beyond his conception.
With fiend-like satisfaction he began the work
of death while the priests meekly yielded to
their fate, as their accuser, now their murderer
slew man after man till the whole eighty-five
were weltering in their blood. One would
gladly believe that he who consented to bo
the perpetrator of this bloody deed did not
belong to th ^ genus man ; but rather that he
was an incarnate demon. The infamous Doeg
however, guilty as he was,, was far less guilty
than the king his master ; and the rage ot the
latter was not yet appeased. Doeg and other
tools of Saul's cruelty and injustice were sent
fco Nob with orders to slay all the inhabitants.
This shocking mandate was carried out to the
very letter. Neither the hoary -headed man,
who leaned on his staff for very age, nor the
helpless woman, nor e\en the tender infant
was spared ; and as if there was not enough
of human blood in that city to satisfy the
king's thirst, all the domestic animals were also
slain. In Saul's first acb of flagrant disobe-
dience his conscience so admonished him of
his wrong that it was difficult to disregard its
admonitions. To use his own expressive
la^nguage he "forced" himself; and at the
close of his carreer, when told by Samuel of
his approaching death it tortured him as
with scorpian sting ; but here in the midst of
life the godlike monitor within was altogether
silent.

DOEO.

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One and one only of all the people of Nob
escaped. This was Abiather the son of
AhJinelech. He fled to David and told him
what Saul had done. David like a true peni-
tent, takes the blame on himself. We seem
to hear the throbbings of his heart as he con-
fesses •* I have occasioned the death of all the
persons of thy father's house." David did
for Abiather all he, at that time, could do.
He accepted him as one of his company, and
assured him that his life should be as carefully
guarded as his own.

The historian has not told us how Saul
rewarded Doeg for his service. He was pro-
bably loaded with wealth and honors. If this
supposition be correct David was not the only
mourner when Saul was slain. With intense
anxiety would Doeg await the issue of that
battle ; and he would tremble as a reed shaken
by the wind when he learned that Saul,
Jonathan, Abinadab and Melchishua, were all
dead ; not that he loved them, for he was
incapable of love ; nor did he care that the
battle had made many wives widows and
many childreYi fatherless. There was one
cause for anxiety above and beyond all these.
He was in danger of losing his wealth ; there
was agony in the thought of that. We may
presume that after a night of utter restless-
ness he resolved with all his movable posses-
sions to return to his own country. True the
noble, generous Abner had caused Saul's only
surviving son Ish-bosheth to be proclaimed

112

THE EDOMITES.

king, and was making the most vigorous
efforts to defend his house. But well did
Doeg know that there was a strong party in
favor of the son of Jesse ; and even if Ish-
bosheth should ultimately be established on
the throne of his father, sacrifices, for the
time, would be called for from his friendvS.
There were many things so lightly esteemed
by Doeg that he was ever ready to sacrifice
them. Among these things were character,
principles, and the reputation, property and
lives of others ; but his own comfort and con-
venience he would rarely sacrifice, and his
wealth never. True to himself though false
to everyone else, a few days after the disas-
trous battle on Gilboa's bleak and barren
heights Doeg was probably safe in the far-
famed Potra.

Not long after David's ascension to the
throne he warred against Edorn. It is not
quite supposable, that as he had caused,
though unintentionally, the murder of all
Abiathar's relatives, he resolved to avenge
that priest's wrongs, and to this end demanded
that Doeg should be delivered up to him ; and
that the Edomites refusing compliance with
this demand, war was declared against them ?
The eldest son of Teruiah, Abishai was for
some time at the head of his uncle's forces in
Edom. We read of but one engagement and
that occurred in the Valley of Salt. Abishai
gained a complete victory. He is not seen in
Edom after that battle. May he not have

DOEG.

113

been so severely wounded as to be obliged to
return home ? His brother, the invincible
Joab, took his place. He remained in Edom
six months and during that period prosecuted
the work of death. As has been said of
Edward I., king of England, so it may be
truthfully said of King David: "He was
never cruel but from motives of policy." One
hence infers that if this worse than extermin-
ating war was carried on by his command
from month to month, there were, undoubtedly,
reasons for it which are not apparent. But is
it not possible that Joab exceeded his com-
mission ? The approbrious epithet, " a bloody
man," which Shimei, not altogetner without
reason, applied to David, is most emphatically
true when applied to Joab. Like the war
horse described in the book of Job, Joab said
among the trumpets, " ha ! ha !" and smelled
the battle afar off. It is evident that David,
though king, was at times unable to control
the conduct of Joaband that of his brothers, the
brave Abishai and the light-footed Asahel ; for
on one occasion we hear from him the plaintive
exclamation : *' These men, the sons of Teruiah
be too hard for me." That Joab was a skillful
general none can doubt, for he never lost a
battle. He was also incontestably brave ; and
in the main, if not entirely devoted to his
uncle's interest. That he was capable of very
strong attachment is shewn by his carrying
the lifeless body of his youngest brother a
long distance, and that after a day of hard

114

VHE EDOMITES.

fighting, in order to inter it in the family
burial grounfl But he loved war ; it was his
element. '. im the sight of human blood
seems to have been exhilirating ; and on more
than one occasion he shed the blood of war in
a time of peace. In the latter part of the
reign of David there was a deeper, stronger
reason than the natural temperament of Joab
which rendered it difficult if not impossible
for the king to oblige him to comply with his
wishes. David committed enormous sins, and
to these sins Joab had been privy. If the king
should displease him might not these sins be
made public ? and would not that be fatal to
the king's reputation ?

Though there is much to hate as well as
much to admire in the character of Joab,
there probably are few persons whose eyes have
not been blurred with tears as in imagination
they have looked on the grand old man as he
fled to the courts of the tabernacle and laid
hold of the horns of the altar, and heard him
utter those resolute yet pathetic words : " Nay,
but I will die here." But I have digressed too
far for I am not writing an obituary of Joab,
but telling of the woes of Edom.

How dark is the picture which the historian
presents to us in the following short sentence :
" For six months did Joab remain there with
all Israel, till he had cut off every male in
Edom." It is probable that one battle followed
another till the Edomites had no lonccer an
enemy to bring into the field, and that Joab

DOEQ.

115

and his men then hunted them as if they were
beasts of prey. The men, perchance at times
took refuge in their excavated dwellings ; and
as Ahimilech many years previously, when
his enemies sought for safety in the tower of
Shechum, pitted combustible materials around
it, and then setting them on fire suffocated or
burned all the inmates, so Joab may have
kindled fires at the entrances of these caves
and left the poor wretches no alternative but
to die of suffocation or rush into the flames.
At the end of these terrible six months
king David went to Edom. May he not have
heard of atrocities committed by his nephew ?
and did he not determine to ameliorate the
condition of this^ miserable people ? May not
the king have been both pained and surprised
to find, that the slain 'lad lain unburied ? and
that in many instanc3s decomposing corpses
had produced pestilence among the survivors ?
Orders for the interment of the dead were at
once issued, and reliable men sent to see that
the orders were promptly obeyed. Did not
even bearded men weep as they looked upon
the groups of the slain ? How many mothers
would h() found like Bizpah watching over
their dead, suffering neither the birds of the
air to touch them by day, nor the beasts of
prey by night. In one place, perhaps, were
found a group of half famished children,
lavishing their kisses on the lifeless form of a
once loving father, and frantically calling on
him to awake; in another would be seen

f«

•■*

I I

116

THE EDOMITES.

aged parents with grief too deep to find its
way to the eyes in tears, bowed over the
corpse of a son on whom they had leaned for
support ; and in still another place would be
seen the young wife who through the intensity
of her anguish had fallen down dead on the
dead body of her husband. In one cave they
would find the charred remains of a band of
men ; and in another, the helpless invalid
emaciated more by hunger than disease, with
no one to minister to his wants. But I forbear
for the heart sickens as one contemplates the
sad scenes which would continually present
themselves to those who were engaged in the
work of interment.

The suflferings of this nation were not
confined to the fearful half year, during which
the work of destruction was going on ; but
necessarily extended to a lengthened period
of time. N^ot to speak of the utter desolation
of heart experienced by childless mothers,
widowed wives, and fatherless children, their
outward condition must have been most
wretched. Take from any community all the
men between the ages of sixteen and sixty,
and there is taken from it all the bone and
sinew without which it is scarcely possible
that life can be sustained. This would be
true of any community, in any country, but
the more especially in the mountainous district
of Edom, where there were but limited portions
of fertile soil, and the inhabitants depended
chiefly on the skill of the husbandman and
the spoils of war.

DOEO.

117

We are ignorant as to the length of time
king David remained in this conquered, half
depopulated country, or how he was employed
while there ; but it scarcely could have been
otherwise than that he who sings so beautifully
of the Lord being good to all and His tender
mercies being over all his work, did all that
could safely be done to mitigate the sufferings
of this unhappy people. David, however,
took due pains to secure the conquest that had
been made, leaving all the fortified towns and
cities garrisoned by his own soldiers. The
almost impregnable Petra was among the
cities which at this time came into David's
possession. Was it not because the great God
had given him assurance that Edom should be
vanquished by his arms and that eyrie-like
fortress should become his which caused him
to indite the following triumphant song : —

*' Gilead is mine, and Manasseh is mine :
Ephraim is also the strength of my head ;
Judah is my law giver ;
Moab is my wash-pot ;
Over Edom will I cast out my shoe ;
Philistia, triumph thou because of me I
Who will bring me into the strong city ?
Who will lead me into Edom ?
Wilt not thou, 0 God, who has cast us off?
Wilt not thou, 0 God, go forth with our hosts ?"

gg^

ifc&n,.;*^

118

THE EDOMITES.

CHAPTER X.

HADAD.

iIIE name Hadad is one with which
every bible reader ought to be familiar,
it being met with in the dynasties of Syria
and Edom. It was the appellation of the sun
in the first named country, and was thence
transferred to the king. I have spoken of it
as a name, but it probably was, like Pharaoh
and Ahimelech, an official title rather than a
name. It had been well for mankind if kings,
like the sun, dispersed light and comfort, and
not as has been often the case, exercised an
influence which would be fitly represented by
the sun's absorbing the greater part of the
fruits of the earth into himself. The Hadad,
who is the subject of this chapter, is the only
one referred to in the bible who appeals
strongly to our sympathies. His misfortunes,
his adventures, and his patriotism, alike inter-
est us, and respectively call forth our pity,
our wonder, and our admiration. The record
we have of him is brief, but it is as suggestive
as brief. We first meet with him during
Edom's reign of terror. It is presumable that
his father was slain and that he had reason
to believe that Joab intended to slay him too.
Though but a little child he determined to
save his life by flight, or if he must perish, to
perish while endeavoring to escape. This

LM Lili

HADAD.

119

resolution he would of course name to such
of his late father s servants as he knew were
devoted to his interests. They consented of
course to accompany him, and they probably
departed as soon as they were shrouded by
the curtains of night; and were out of the
territory of Edom before it was generally
known that they had left the palace. His
mother, if she was still living, would be as
anxious for his departure as she would have
been under ordinary circumstances to have
him near her. A mother's is the only earthly
love which is wholly unselfish in its nature.
A Jochebed laid her boy in the flags at the
river's brink with the hope that he might
become the possession of another since his life
was insecure with her ; the mother in the days
of Solomon yielded her babe to false claims
rather than it should be slain ; and in modern
times the beautiful and accomplished Anna
Boleyn when about to be executed by the
king her husband, spoke of him as a good and
gentle prince, a most gracious sovereign,
hoping thus to gain his favor for her child,
the then little princess Elizabeth.

All that we are told relative to the journey
is "They arose out of Midian and came to
Paran, and they took men with them out of
Paran and came to Egypt." There is so much
obscrurity as to what is here to be understood
by either Midian or Paran that of the first
part of their journey, at least, it is in vain even
to attempt to conjecture the scenes through

."/PT

120

THE EDOMITES.

'■i^'i' ■•:;

«h.ItroiW»».

which they passed. It is evident, that either
from choice or necessity some years elapsed
between Hadad leaving his home in Edom
and his arrival in Egypt. It may be that he
like the great and good Alfred lived for some
time in cognito m the cottage of a peasant,
and like him was required to assist in domes-
tic duties. But wherever Hadad lived, or
however he was employed, he was a little
child when he left home, and a man when he
presented himself at the court of Paraoh.
Though he was homeless and penniless his
reception was, in all respects, such as was
fitting a king to bestow on a king's son.
Pharaoh did not content himself with mere
courteousness toward the young prince ; but
also bestowed on him the most substantial bene-
fits. He settled on him such a salary as enabled
him to live in a manner corresponding to his
rank, furnished with a suitable residence, and
made him the owner of considerable territory.
The Edomitish prince was, no doubt, a fre-
quent visitor at the royal palace; and as
women in Egypt, at that time, were neither
toys, nor slaves, but on the contrary occupied
much the same place that they do now in
this country, that is to say, they were the
loved and honored companions of their fathers,
husbands, and brothers. Hadad there, it is
presumed, made the acquaintance of the sisters
of Tahpenes the queen. From being mere
acquaintances they became friends, and
ultimately their friendship ripened into love.

HADAD.

121

Hadad, though a prince and living in princely-
style, was but a pensioner on the bounty of
Pharaoh ; and it was, doubtless, with the
greatest diffidence that he asked the king,
his benefactor to allow him to become 'his
brother-in-law. The request, however, seems
to have been no sooner made than granted ;
and the marriage was in due time consum-
mated. Time passed on and Hadad became
the father of a boy whom he named Genubath.
The birth of the prince seems to have given
scarcely less joy to Pliaraoh and Tahpenes
than to his parents, and they determined on
educating him with their own sons. Thev
were so anxious to have him in their own
palace that they would not consent to his re-
maining longer with his parents than while he
was a nurseling ; but he was brought to the
royal palace even to be weaned.

Though Hadad was living, we may pre-
sume, in domestic bliss and in the enjoyment
of all the favors Pharaoh could bestow, he
never forgot or ceased to love his own country.
The patriot never does that. He, on the
contrary would embrace every opportunity of
learning what was passing in Edom and in
the kingdom of Israel, in order thai iie might
if possible, aid the former and avenge himself
on the latter. At one time his hopes may
have been raised by learning that a son of
king David had rebelled against him, and
that the rebellion had assumed so serious an
attitude that the king was obliged to leave

11 i;

l!'^' w'

1: 'i-

|!|i''J!

122

THE EDOMITES.

his capital and flee for his life. It was even
said that one Shiinei, who was connected with
the former dynasty, reproached him as one
addicted to the shedding of blood, and invoked
curses on his head, and that the fugitive king
did not deem himself safe till he had passed
over the Jordan. Hadad, however, would
have had hardly time to congratulate himself
over these tidings, ere he learned that the
rebellion had been crushed, the leader slain,
peace restored, and that the king had become
more popular than ever.

Years passed, Genubath was a bearded
man and the head of Hadad was whitened
with the snows of age ; and as yet no oppor-
tunity occurred of serving his country and
avenging her wrongs. Meanwhile the bound-
aries of the kingdom of Israel had come in
such dose proximity to Egypt that it v^as no
unusual thing to meet with Israelites in that
country. On one occasion we will suppose
that Hadad met an Israelite, and so far con-
quered his aversion as to enter into conversa-
tion with him, and the Israelite, taking Hadad
for an Egyptian, and seeing he was interested in
what was going on in the kingdom of Israel,
spoke as follows : " Great changes have taken
place in our country during the past few
years. Not only is the warlike king David
dead, but his brave nephews, Joab and
Abishai, are also dead, with many others whom
we once considered the bulwarks of the nation.
These losses, however, heavy as they are in

'•!:^V")i^

HAD AD.

123

themselves, are scarcely felt ; for not only are
we blessed with universal peace, but our king
is in possession of almost super-human wisdom.
It is admitted by all, that in wisdom, riches,
and honor, he surpasses every other king on
the face of the earth. You can infer the vast
number of his household from the fact that
they consume daily thirty measures of fine
flour, and sixty measures of meal, thirty oxen,
and one hundred sheep, besides harts and roe-
bucks, and fallow deer, and fatted fowl. The
grandeur of the king's palace is in perfect
keeping with the number of his attendants ;
but there are few things which excite greater
surprise and admiration, than the throne which
is made of ivory— a new importation — and
overlaid with fine gold. This throne is reached
by six steps made of gold and on each side of
every step golden lions are placed as if on
guard. Tb3 king has made two hundred
targrets and three hundred massive shields of
beaten gold ; but unfortunately they are not
very often seen being kept in the house of
the forest of Lebannon. All the drinking
vessels in the palace are of gold, none of
any other material being allowed in the king's
presence. It has been suggested by some,
that gold may not always be seen in such
abundance, in our country, but there appears
to me to be no cause for fear; for all the
kings of the earth with other valuable gifts
bring vessels of gold, and a short time since
a queen from Southern Arabia brought king

. I

:tl-

124

THE EDOMITES.

Solomon no less than one hundred and twenty
talents of gold. There are so many sources
from which our king receives gold that his
average annual receipt is six hundred and
sixty-six talents. But even without this
supply the king's treasuries are seemingly
exhaustless. You have doubtless heard of the
numerous conquests of the late king, and of
the immense sums of gold thus accumulated.
The Edomites were among the most stubborn
of King David's foes and they were treated
with the severity they so richly merited. Not
only was every man capable of bearing arms
slain but every shekel of gold carried away.
I presume that people will give us no further
trouble, for during the past forty years the
tribute imposed upon them has been punctually
paid, though the collectors say that the people
in order to raise it are obliged to live on the,
meanest fare. A short time since a young
princess, the last relic of the royal family, was
by the king's command, brought to Jerusalem.
There are rumors that the king intends she
shall be his wife; and although the apart-
ments alloted her and the number of her
attendants go to strengthen tha,t rumor, it
appears to me incredible that one so wise and
great as our king, should ally himself to one
who belongs to so vile a nation." Hadad
doubtless would so conceal his feelings in such
a case as to cause the speakers to think that
his sympathies were with Israel, but his heart
would burn with indignation, and when he

n^samm-

HADAD.

125

entered his palace he would give vent to his
long suppressed anguish in sighs and gi" )ans.
If an interview like that just related, was an
actual occurrence, Hadad's cheerfulness would
forsake him. He would be fond of solitude,
reticent in company and sometimes he might
half audibly say, " My bleeding country, my
down trodden people." At length he lesolved
to return to his own country and effect her
deliverance from Israel's yoke, or with his
countrymen die. Hadad's choice would com-
pare not unfavorably with that of Moses in
somewhat similar circumstances, were it not
that the latter loved his people chiefly becr/jse
they were the people of God, and the former
because they were his own people. The love
of country is one of the noblest motives by
which a man can be actuated ; the love of
God is the noblest.

As Hadad did not lack decision of charac-
ter, he would no sooner resolve to return to
Edom than begin to carry his resolution into
effect. First of all, however, he would, think
it necessary to obtain the consent of the king
his brother-in-law, to whom he was very
deeply indebted. The consent was given,
though Pharaoh might not be able to under-
stand how one surrounded by so many com-
forts could v/ish to change his situation for
one of toil and privation. He had endeavored
to anticipate all Hadad's wants ; but did not
his wish to depart show that something had
been left undone ! " What hast thou lacked

! W

126

THE EDOMITES.

with me," Pharaoh ingenuously inquires,
" that behold thou seekest to return to thine
own country ?" To thie question Hadad gave a
very respectful answer without at all com-
mitting himself. " Nothing, howbeit let me
go in any wise," Pharoah appears to have
made no further remonstrance ; but he prob-
ably dared not furnish Hadad with an army.
Not only was the kingdom of Israel great
and powerful ; but her renowned king was his
son-in-law, and therefore more nearly related
to him than the Edomitish prince. He
wished to serve Hadad, but he wished still
more for the friendship and esteem of Solomon.
Hadad finding that Pharoah would neither
aid nor oppose him, seems quietly to have left
his adopted country, where for about half a
century, he had enjoyed all the privileges
connected with royalty, without its onerous
cares and heavy responsibilities.

As Hadad neared the frontiers of Edom he
would, one would suppose, doff everything
which .betokened his rank, and would be in
appearance an Egyptian in the common walks
of life. When he entered his late father's
dominion his spirit would die within him.
True, there were to be seen a large number
of stalwart men whom he would recognise as
his own countrymen ; but they would all be
engaged in the most servile and laborious
occupations, and all positions, of trust and
authority would be filled by Israelites. He
would be especially pained to see that all the

HADAD.

127

fortresses were garrisoned by Israelitish
soldiers, and under the command of Israelitish
officers ; and that not a single Edomite was in
the possession of arms. Hadad as an
Egyptian could consult freely with all,
whether Israelites or Edomites; and he would
continually notice superciliousness of the con-
querors, and the stern hatred and indignation
of t^ e conquered. The feeling of hatred would
be more particularly strong among the women.
With them the names of Joab and Abishai
would be synonymous with blood shedding
and murder. So far would they be from
wishing to conceal their hatred they would
make it their boast. To hate the Israelite
would be one of the first lessons the mother
would teach her babe ; and the cry for ven-
geance on their oppressors would be a part of
every prayer. Old women — there were no old
men — would gather their children and
grand-children around them, and talk for
hours of the horrible cruelties prepetrated by
Joab during the never to be forgotten six
months in which their fathers, and nusbands,
and brothers were either slain in battle or
mercilessly butchered. The half century
which had elapsed since the tragedy, so far
from obliterating it from their enemies, but
burned it the more deeply, till the anguish
was as that of cancerous sore. This state of
feeling would cause Hadad to be the more
hopeful, for he well knew that while the soul
asserted its freedom the victory of the con-
querors was incomplete..

if
1 '■

A M

128

THE EDOMITES.

We will now leave Edom to notice occur-
ing events in the kingdom of Israel, as it is
probable, these, in a great measure, determined
Hadad's line of policy.

Solomon had not been king very long when
he married a daughter of Pharaoh king of
Egypt. That Solomon was of commanding
presence, and his bride exceedingly fair, may
be inferred from some passage in the song
which bears his name. While there are few
christians who do not believe that that inim-
itable piece of composition : " The Song of
Solomon," refers to the Lord Jesus Christ the
husband of the church, and to the church his
bride, probably all will admit that it had an
historical foundation.

Though the marriage of Solomon with an
Egyptian princess must have startled the
people of Israel, she met with a magnificent
reception. Gifts were lavished on her, and
for her special use a stately palace was
erected at an enormous cost, and there with
the virgins, her companions, that followed her
she lived in the enjoyment of such pleasures
as money could purchase. The frontier city
Gezer had threatened the tranquility of Israel ;
this Pharaoh conquered and gave to his
daughter as a part of her dower, which would
have a tendency to render the marriage
popular.

Though Pharaoh's daughter was Solomon's
chief wife and is by him designated "my wife,"
as if he had no other, he was at the time of

HADAD.

12D

his marriage with her the husband of f,t least
one other woman. Even at the time of his
father s death he was not only a husband but
the father of a boy some twelve months old.
The mother of this boy was Naamah an
Ammonitess; and it has been conjectured that
this marriage was brought about by king
David to serve political purposes. Had the
Egyptian princess been blessed with a son, it
is probable that he and not the son of Naamah
would have been the successor of Solomon.
After the marriage of Solomon with Pharaoh's
daughter one wife after another was added in
quick succession till he had seven hundred
wives princesses, and three hundred secondary
wives. But the wants of a harem of a
thousand women and their attendants was a
very small part of the king's expenses. The
creation of fine buildings was with him a
passion. One followed another with ruinous
rapidity. He too, was scarcely less fond of
fine horses than fine buildings. Immense As
was his income his expenditures were still
more immense so that in time the treasury
became exhausted ; and the people no longer
fascinated by his magnificence, groaned under
his taxes. While this state of things existed
it was rumored that the king's health was not
firm ; and although he had just passed life's
meridian he seemed the old man. It may,
too, have been rumored that he was subject to
fits of melancholy, and that sometimes he
would remain silent for a long time and then

Iff

•-«

! »

> \h

130

THE EDOMITES.

with a deep sigh exclaim : " Vanity of vanities,
all is vanity." The people very naturally
began to think of a successor. Rehoboam,
Solomon's only son, had never manifested any
interest in the affairs of the kingdom. Pleasure
had thus far been the business of his life.
Surrounded by the young, the gay, and the
thoughtless, his days were spent in feasting
and, perchance, his nights often in revelry.
His father's wise and prudent counsellors
woald look on him with distrust, and were
treated by him with disrespect, not to say
contempt. As for Solomon's two daughters,
they were very common place women and
were both married, Taphath, to the son of
Abinadab, and Basmuth to Ahlmaaz, both
commissariat officers to the king. It was quite
evident that neither they nor their father, nor
the people expected that either of them would
ever come to the throne. Public feeling was
still more agitated by learning that a prophet
of the Lord had told one Jeroboam, a servant
of Solomon, that he should reign over ten of
the tribes of Israel. There was still another
difficulty, Regon, who at this time reigned at
Damascus, made raids into the kingdom of
Israel, and thus kept the people in continual
alarm ; and it is possible that Solomon, sup-
posing that Edom was completely subjugated,
recalled his troops from that country in order
to protect the northern part of his kingdom.
If this was indeed done, Hadad would be
ready to take advantage of this juncture and

<^am^'^-^

EDOM, A DEPENDENCY OF JUDAH. 131

declare the independence of his country ; and
they, perhaps, in return, — he had doubtless,
long before this made himself known to his
countrymen — would proclaim him king.
There is no intimation as to the way by which
Hadad avenged himself on Israel. It is pre-
sumable that he and Regon acted in concert,
for they alike had an old grudge against the
house of David, which had developed into
deep rooted, implacable, inexorable hate. To
use the forcible language of Scripture, "they
abhorred Israel." The injuries inflicted by
Hadad must have been of a y ery grave nature,
for Regon was " an adversary to Israel all the
days of Solomon," and side by side wuth him
is mentioned " the mischief that Hadad did."

CHAPTER XL

EDOM, A DEPENDENCY OF JUDAH.

FTER the

reign

of Solomon the Edom-

ites have no place on the historic page
for fifty years, that is till the time of Jehos-
ophat; and there are probably few Bible
readers who have not wished to exhume this
portion of their history in order to learn
whether or not Edom through Hadad obtained
her independence, and that he regained his
ancestral throne, was succeeded by his son
Genuboth. If that prince — an Egyptian by

; -I.

132

THE EDOMITES.

'P'

,hi-

■ •m

birth, and by his mother's side — sat on the
throne of Edom when Jeroboam, with his
Egyptian wife, ruled the kingdom of Israel,
and Shishak was ravaging the kingdom of
Judah, he, no doubt, looked on with intense
interest; and, perchance, imagined that the
whole of Palestine would ultimately become
the property of Egypt. Genubath did not
know that the great God had said that the
sceptre should not depart from Judah, nor a
lawgiver from between his feet till the Shiloh
should come, and that heaven and earth might
pass away rather than His word be unful-
filled.

When Edom again appears in history her
king was only such in name, being a mere
deputy. That Edom was a dependency of
Judah is seen from Jehosaphat being in pos-
session of her seaport on the Red Sea, Ezion-
geber, and there fitting out a fleet. It was
evidently a deputy or viceroy who accompa-
nied the kings of Judah and Israel when they
invaded Moab. He does not appear to have
been consulted relative to the undertaking,
but to have gone with Jehoram and Jehosa-
phat by the bidding of the latter. His reti-
cence on this occasion is very observable.
Neither in the danger to which they are
exposed for want of water, nor in the inter-
view with the prophet Elisha, does he prt;sume
to speak ; but meekly submits his will to the
will of his superiors. And that Elisha knew
that the king of Edom occupied but a subor-

EDOM, A DEPENDENCY OF JUDAH. 133

dinate position may be inferred from the fact
that wliile he, with great severity, reproves
Jehoram for his sins, and tacitly commends
the piety of the king of Judah, no allusion is
made to him.

By the command jf Elisha the valley in
which the allied armies were encamped was
made full of ditches, and these ditches w^ere
miraculously filled with water. As the whole
military force of Moab went out to meet the
invading army the sun shone upon the water
and it became red by his reflected rays. The
Moabites, being acquainted wdth the locality,
and knowing it was not supplied with streams
of water, came to the conclusion that the
water was in reality what it was in appear-
ance, blood. They were jubilant. "The
kings," said they, " are surely slain, and they
have smitten one another, and now, therefore,
Moab to the spoil ;" and they eagerly rushed
upon the camp of the confederate kings. To
their equal astonishment and dismay they
found an armed host ready to receive them.
A horrible carnage ensued. The Edomites
seem to have remained inactive, and one infers
— base as w^ould be such an act — that they
sent a messenger to the king of Moab saying
that, if he would unite his forces with tiiem,
theyVould aid in opposing Judah and Israel.
Hastily did the king of Moab take seven
hundred of his choice men, and with them
sword in hand endeavor to cut his way through
opposing hosts to join the forces of the Edom-

'i*^!fe^.(S^a<,£,!

134

THE EDOMITES.

♦ '"I..

ites. His utmost efforts were vain. Seeing
that the valor of even his picked men was of
no avail, Mesha — for that was the name of
the king of Moab — concluded that he had
incurred the displeasure of Chemosh, his god,
and that, at whatever cost, he must be propi-
tiated. Judging of what would be most
acceptable to Chemosh by what was most
precious to himself, he resolved to give his
tirst-born for his transgression, the fruit of
his body for the sin of his soul. There was
no time to be lost. They had taken refuge in
Kir-haraseth, a very strong fort, but even in
this, their last resort, the slingers still con-
tinued their work of death. Suddenly the
Moabites cease to fight. Mesha and his eldest
son, the heir-apparent to the throne, ascend
the wall. All eyes are turned toward them.
A fire is kindled. Mesha plunges his sword
into the heart of the trembling boy and then
throws the body, still instinct with life, into
the flames. A wild shriek of agony rends the
air. Terror seizes every heart, and palsies
every arm. The allied army return home.

Moab, stung to the quick with her defeat,
determined to embrace the earliest opportu-
nity to retrieve her honor. Though the
slaughter among her troops had been really
dreadful, and the injury done to the coilntry
irreparable, her treasury was not exhausted.
She, therefore, entered into a league with the
Ammonites and the Edomites to invade the
kingdom of Judah. Ammon was the natural

EDOM, A DEPENDENCY OF JUDAH. 135

ally of Moab, and Edom, Judah's vassal, was
willing to incur the risk of having a heavier
tribute imposed on her, as she seems to have
indulged the hope that she might poissibly rid
herself of it altogether. They did not declare
war, for they were not in a condition to do
that, but they so arranged as to come upon
the kingdom of Judah unawares. So well
concerted were their measures, and so faithful
had they been to each other in preserving
secrecy, that they were within thirty-five or
forty miles of Jerusalem before Jehosaphat
heard of their approach. Even then the
tidings came to him accidentally, I have said
accidentally, but it is doubtful whether the
word accident should not be expunged from
the believer's vocabulary. Can an accident
befall one who is made an object of care so
tender that the very hairs of his head are
numbered, and who is so precious to the
omniscient God that to touch such an one is
to touch the apple of His eye ?

There is a mystery in the sovereignty of
God as connected with man's free agency
which I am unable to solve. The Lord Jesus
Christ was delivered by the determinate
counsel and foreknowledge of God, yet was
He taken by wicked hands, crucified and
slain^ — none the less wicked because they
were carrying out the purposes of the Al-
mighty God ; and, in the instance before us,
the Divine will was accomplished by man's
free, responsible, and sinful conduct. God

>'i»'tti*yK W\ii>flftfr3Ytxk/,lJrt,^

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136

THE EDOMITES.

had determined that Jehosaphat should have
a complete victory without the loss of a single
man, and it was brought about in this wise.
While the allies were preparing for battle
some dispute arose among them. Perhaps it
was relative to the manner in which their
armies should be arranged in opposing the
army of Judah. The Moabites and the
Ammonites were on one side of the question,
whatever it may have been, and the Edomites
on the other. The contention became so sharp
that words were followed by blows, and blows
with armed men meaning ghastly wounds
and death. So far did they indulge their
rage that the conflict continued till all the
Edomites were slain, and then the men of
Moab and Ammon slew each other. Edom
had cause to rue her temerity, for so far was
she from gaining her independence from this
invasion that she lost very heavily in men,
money and arms; and her taxes vfere prob-
ably increased in the same ratio that her
ability to pay them decreased.

We hear nothing more of Edom during the
remainder of the reign of Jehosaphat. She
was in much the same condition that she was
in the latter part of the reign of David —
without an army or a sufficient number of
men to make one. They submitted to Judah
because there was no alternative but sub-
mission.

Jehosaphat was succeeded by his son
Jehoram, a wicked man, aided in his wicked-

EDOM, A DEPENDENCY OF JUDAH. 137

ness by his wicked wife. Athaliah was one
of the very few women who have ever lived
who had not a single virtue. One fain would
wish that she never had had an existence. A
woman without tenderness is an anomaly
from which one recoils with abhorrence. As
Jehoram had forsaken his father's God his
reign was as disastrous as his father's had
been prosperous. The Eldomites who had
partially recovered ^rom their misfortunes,
and who were never subdued in spirit, took
advantage of the depressed state of Judah
to revolt, and declare themselves independent-
Jehoram determined to reduce them again to
obedience. Though he was not beloved by
his subjects, yet, as their own honor and inte-
rests were in a line with his wishes, they
cheerfully aided him in his undertaking.
Jehoram, therefore, mustering all his hosts
went, with all his war chariots, to the front' '^r
of Edom, expecting that the enemy would be
so terrified by their numbers as to ofier little
if any resistan^-.e. It would seem that they
were so free from the fear of an attack that
they neglected to watch, ior they suddenly
found themselves surrounded by the Edomites.
Their chief dependence was on their war
chariots- They expected to mow down the
ranks of Edom as the grass of the field. But
their circumstances rendered these chariots
but an incumbrance. They, therefore, cut
their way through the Edomites in the quarter
where the least resistance could be made, and

'•■ A''*, . >i , ■'■^•^"■f-t^ti ■

138

THE EDOMITES.

» '^

retreated with the greatest precipitation.
Edom was thus left to the enjoyment of her
independence. She had long served the
descendants of Jacob, but now experienced
the fulfilment ot the latter part of Isaac's
prophecy :

"And it shall come to pass when thou shalt have the
dominion,
That thou shalt break his yoke from oJBT thy neck.'*

CHAPTER XII.

THE KINGDOM OF EDOM.

E are leffc entirely to conjecture as to
who at this time reigned over Edom,
but one imagines him to have been a descend-
ant of the half Egyptian Genubath, and that
he, being at the head of the army, obliged
Judah to retreat, and thus saved Edom
instrumentally from another devastating war.
Edom was unmolested for the next half cen-
tury, that is, till the reign of Amaziah, king
of Judah. She, notwithstanding the losses
she had sustained in the time of Jehosaphat,
was now quite a strong nation ; for when
Amaziah determined on making an invasion
he deemed it necessary for that purpose to
hire one hundred thousand men, though he
was already at the head of an army three
hundred thousand strong. The occasion for

THE KINGDOM OF EDOM.

139

this war is not given, but it wr , evidently
just, for God was with the army of Judah.
In the time of which 1 write to obey God
insured worldly success ; but to us who live
in the full blaze of gospel light it is far from
being the case. We do not need that kind of
proof that God hates sin and loves righteous-
ness. Now the best men are often the least
prosperous. God's favor is seen not by what
we receive but by what we becoi \e. " Love
your enemies," says our adorable Redeemer,
" Bless them that curse you, and do good to
them that hate you, and pray for them that
despittjfully use you and persecute you," not
that you may be wealthy and be respected
and honored. No. Something infinitely
better than that — " That ye may be the chil-
dren of your Father which is in heaven."
No gift which God can bestow is so valuable
as the impartation of Himself. The heaven
of heavens will be to see Christ and to be
like Him.

But to proceed with the history. As in
the war in the days of David so now, the first
engagement took place in the Valley of Salt.
This seems to have been disastrous ground to
Edom ; for she on this occasion, as well as on
that referred to, suflfered a signal defeat.
Ten thousand of her men were slain, and
another ten thousand were taken prisoners.
These prisoners occasioned Amaziah some
anxiety or inconvenience, ind he summarily
disposed of them by throwing them headbng

• f.

'j"-*«st«ii>e»'Si()Sh,,

140

THE EDOMITES.

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from a rock. A series of successes attended
the army of Judah, and they again obtained
possession of the renowned Petra. As the
vain, hard-hearted, ambitious Elizabeth ack-
nowledged God's hand after the destruction
of the Spanish fleet by the motto : " He blew
with His wind and they were scattered," so
the wicked Amaziah admitted that it was by
God and not by the prowess of himself or his
men that the almost impregnable Petra had
been taken, by naming that city Joktheah —
subdued of God. Troubles at home obliged
the king of Judah to return thither much
sooner than he had intended ; and, entering
almost immediately on another war which
required the whole of his forces, he was
unable to retain the conquests he had made
in Edom, and so she again broke the yoke
from off her neck.

It was only by constant and strenuous
effort that Edom maintained her independence
during the reigns of the good Uzziah and the
almost faultless Jotham ; but when the throne
of Judah was occupied by the infamous Ahaz
that kingdom was reduced to such extremity
by her northern neighbors, Israel and Syria>
that so far from attempting to subject other
nations to her sway, she had to struggle for
her own existence. Edom did not fail to take
advantage of these misfortunes. She made
raids into that kingdom, and not orly took
much spoil but also killed many of the people,
and- carried others captive. Edom, on various

THE KINGDOM OF EDOM.

141

le was

occasions, had suffered very severely from the
people of Judah, and whenever they were in
her power she paid them their own with
fearful interest. The great God not only per-
mits but requires us to imitate Him in His
love, in His mercy, in His tenderness, and in
His long suffering and forgiveness. But ven-
geance is not the prerogative of man; it
belongs to God only. The unregenerate,
however, are prone to take the execution of
vengeance into their own hands, and this
spirit is sometimes exhibited even by the pro-
fessedly pious. But it prevails in all lands
and among all peoples where the Bible is
unknown ; and Edom was more relentless,
more implacable, and more cruel in her
vengeance than most other nations. " Her
anger did tear perpetually, and she kept her
wrath forever."

Open enmity is inexcusable, but to injure
those for whom one professes friendship is
much worse. There is a meanness as well as
a wickedness in such a course which all detest.
To this execrable meanness the Edomites
stooped during the siege of Jerusalem by the
Chaldeans. For Zedekiah they professed
friendship, and to him they sent ambassadors
encouraging him to oppose the king of labylon
and at the same time they had emissaries in
the camp of the besiegers selling informc^.tion
relative to the condition and plans of the
besieged, information of which they could not
have been the possessors but for their duplicity.

iSTiiTflTnfirfflEaiil

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142

THE EDOMITES.

|:f

But any description I could give of Edor^i s
conduct during that memorable siege with its
disastrous termination would be puerile when
compared with the graphic picture drawn by
the pen of the inspired Obadiah. It has been
conjectured that Obadiah was a converted
Edomite and the tender pathos commingled
with the dreadful denunciations of that
prophet favors that conjecture. The seven
times repeated " t'hou shouldest not seem the
remonstrance of one who was bone of their
bone and flesh of their flesh, but like his
pious progenetor, Isaac, he dared not disobey
the promptings of the spirit, though his heart
yearned over them with woman's pity, yet in
faithfulness to his God he uttered the terrible
words : " Thou shalt be cut ofl* forever."

I would remark in passing that in this
prophecy we are taught that consanguinity
involves claims which cannot with impunity
be disregarded. Edom was more guilty than
other nations and exposed herself to severer
punishment, though she was but " as one of
them."

" On the conquest of Judah by the Baby-
lonians, the Edomites, probably in reward for
their services during the war, were permitted
to settle in southern Palestine, and the whole
plateau between it and Egypt ; but they were
about the same time driven out of Edom
proper by the Nabatheans. For more than
four centuries they continued to prosper and
retained their new possessions with the excep-

THE KINGDOM OF EDOM.

143

tion of a few towns which the Persian
monorchs compelled them to restore to the
Jews after the captivity. But during the
warlike rule of the Maccabees they were
again completely subdued, and even forced to
conform to Jewish laws and rites and
submit to the government of Jewish Prefects.
The Edomites were now incorporated with
the Jewish nation and the whole province
was often termed by Greek and Roman
writers Idumeah. According to the ceremonial
law Jin Edomite was received ' into the con-
gre!gation of the Lord,' — that is to all the
rights and privileges of a Jew * in the third
generation.' "* They were in this respect
placed on an equality with the Egyptians, but
for reasons vastly different. The privilege
was granted to one people on account of
relationship; to the others because the
Israelites had been for many years sojourners
in their land. Though the Egyptians as a
rule, had treated Israel with great severity,
the former people had conferred some favors
on the latter, and for these could not fail of a
reward : " Whatsoever good thing any man
doeth the same shall he receive of the Lord."

" Never was a deed but left its token,
Written on tables never broken."

As to the number of Edomites who were
believers in the living and true God we have
no record. May we not indulge the hope

*Sinith s Bible Dictionary, Vol. I., page 664.

144

THE EDOMITES.

(I ♦;.

that the number was lai'ge. It has ever been
true, and ever will be, that of all nations, and
kindreds, and peoples, and tongues, all of who
fear God and work righteousness are accc^pted
of Him.

i '

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CHAPTER XIII.

THE HERODIAN FAMILY.

^KhOUGH many of the members ol the
%^iK Herodian family are called Jews, from
their submitting to the rites and embracing ^
the faith of that people, they are admitted to
be Edomites and this little book would be
incomplete without some notice of them, j
shall, however, in accordance with the plan of
this work, confine my remarks almost ex-
clusively to those members of the family to
whom reference is made in the Bible.

The first Edomite of whom we read in the
New Testament is Herod, falsely surnamed,
The Great He was the second son of
Antipator, a clever Idumaean noble, who
was alike noted for his base sycophancy
towards Rome, his inveterate hatred of the
Asmonaian line, his insatiate ambition, and his
unscrupulousness in satisfying the demands
of that ambition. Herod inherited his father's
ability, his father's ambition, his father's
unscrupulousness, and far more than his

THE IIEUODIAN FAMILY.

145

father's cruelty. Does Antigonns become
obnoxious to Herod ? He has the address to
causii his life blood to flow beneath the rods
and axe of the Roman lictor. Does the young
Aristobolus become a favorite with the people ?
He is, as it were, accidentally drowned in a
tank. Does Asmonian blood flow in the veins
of two of his own sons ? To allay his fears
he strangles them. Does the beautiful
Marrianne excite his jealousy ? She dies by
the axe of the executioner. Such was the
character of him who reigned in Judea, when
Christ our Lord was born in Bethlehem.
Herod was at that time not far from £f ty-flve
yeans old and had been a public man about
forty years. Though one cannot even hope
that he was actuated by other than selfish
motives, he spent much time and immense
sums of money in repairing and beautifying
the temple. About five hundred years had
elapsed since its erection by Zerubbabel, and
it was, even from the first, far inferior to
that builded by Solomon , but Herod restored
it to more than its pristine beauty. " What-
ever the exact appearance of its details may
have been, it may safely be asserted that the
triple temple at Jerusalem, — the lower court
standing on its magnificent terraces — the
inner court raised on its platform in the
centre of this — and the temple itself rising
out of this group and crowning the whole —
must have formed, when combined with the
beauty of its situation, one of the most splendid

146

THE EDOMITES.

architectural combinations in the ancient
world."* But while the Jews looked on this
temple with pride, and were ever ready to
call the attention of the passer-by to *the
manne. of stones," they were not likely to be
misled in rega^^d to the king's principles.
While he rebuilt the temple at Jerusalem,
he rebuilt also the temple at Samaria, and
made provision in his new city Caesarea for
the celebration of heathen worship ; and it has
been supposed that the rebuilding of the
temple furnished him with the opportunity of
destroying the authentic collection of geneal-
ogies which was of the highest importance to
the priestly families. Herod, as appears from
his public designs, affected the dignity of a
seco^xd Sclomon ; but he joined the license of
that liionarch to his magnificence, and, it was
said, that vne monument which he raised over
the roval tomb i was due to the fear which
seized him after a sacrilegious attempt to rob
them of their treasures. ""|"

It was near the close of Herod's eventful
life, when he was in infirm health, and engaged
in judicial murders, that our Lord Jesus Christ,
though God with God, came to this earth to
live among men, himself a man. Herod could
not have been ignorant of the fact that the Jews
expected that about this time one would come
who would raise them to great national glory.
Had he not learned that this personage was

* Smith'8 Bible Dictionury, Vol. I., pagfe 3207.
t Sinith'8 New Testament History, p. b6.

THE HERODIAN FAMILY.

147

to be looked for when the sceptre departed
from Judah ? And well did he know that it
had departed, for he, a descendant of Esau,
then held it. Nothing is so impotent as guilt ;
and little faith as Herod had in the Hebrew
Scriptures he would often quail with fear lest
the expectations of the Jews might be realized.
These thoughts would make him unhappy,
and his unhappiness would increase his irri-
tability and cruelty. While in this state of
mind he became cognizant of the fact that
several persons had come from a distant
eastern country with the professed object of
rendering w^orship to a new-born infant who
was the king of the Jews, and saying that
they had been guided thither by a star.
Herod was still more troubled than ever ; he
would conclude that the looked-for deliveiier
had been born, " and how," he mentally asked,
" will his birfch affect me ?" When Hergd tirst
entered on his course of cruelty and injustice
he must have had many qualms of conscience,
and, no doubt, again and again resolved to
lead a better life ; but for many years the
inward monitor had probably been, for the
most part, silent, but now it would lash his
soul to fury. The enormous crimes of which
he had been guilty, av.d a sense of a terrible
retribution would haunt him day and night.
Though stung with remorse he experienced
no true repentance, for he resolved to commit
still another crime by slaying the new-born
king at whatever cost. He would think it

V J"'

148

THE EDOMITES.

i..

ill if

tOMiMMb.

wise, however, to conceal his real intentions,
and, assembling together the learned in his
kingdom, he, as if a seeker after truth, de-
manded of them where Christ should be born,
and they showed him from their sacred books
that Bethlehem should be his birthplace.
Herod dismissed the priests and scribes cour-
teously, probably promising to seek for the
wonderful infant, and, if he could be found, to
yield to his superior claims. In order to
carry out his nefarious plans, and in seeming
conformity to his promise, he sent to the
magi requesting them to come to his palace,
and, with the greatest duplicity, told them
that Tie was not less anxious than they to
honor the remarkable persona gewhose birth
had been for centuries the subject of prophecy,
and had, to them, been heralded by a star.
Herod would tell them further that he had
made enquiries of those who were the most
competent to judge in the matter, and that
they were unanimous in the opinion that the
Messiah was to be born in a small village,
known chiefly as the birthplace of David,
lying a few miles south of Jerusalem, and
that they would be more likely to be success-
ful in finding the child than any embassy
which he could send. He, before dismissing
them, learned the precise time at which the
star had first appeared, believing, no doubt,
that its appearance synchronized with the
child's birth. He exhorted them to search
diligently, and as soon as they found the new-

THE HERODIAN FAMILY.

149

Lie new-

born king to return to him that he might go
and render him due worship. The magi had
lost sight of the star, perhaps they had not
seen it after they had left their own country ;
but when they came out of Herod's pahice it
was again visible, and went before them till
it came to the house where the young child
was. There it stood till they entered the
house, and probably it was never again seen.
There has been a good deal of discussion
about this star. That it was wholly super-
natural and not a natural phenomenon is
evident. This removes it at once from the
region of human speculation. It is called a
star. This much, then, we know, it was a
star. What kind of a star we are not told.
We mav be certain it was not one of the fixed
stars, nor one of the planets, nor a comet, nor
an ordinary meteor. But other things besides
the above are properly called stars ; as, for
instance, a mark of distinction worn on the
robe of a prince, or flying on a flag, or a mark
of reference in a book. Any luminous object,
especially when seen in the air, is properly
called a star. The star seen by the wise men
was a miraculous light, sent, in the first
instance, to inform them that the long-ex-
pected king of the Jews was born ; and again
appearing to them at Jerusalem to guide them
to the very house in Bethlehem where the:
young child was. This star might be described
as " an angel carrying an electric light," or a
celestial lantern sent to light the sages on

kvl

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150

THE EDOMITES.

their way. So much of Christ was revealed
to these men that they accepted him as their
Saviour; and may we not hope that many
are saved by his sacrificial death who have
never learned of him either by the living
voice or the written word ? God is rich in
love, ricii in mercy, rich in power unto all —
however shrouded by darkness — who call
upon him.

The magi worshipped the infant Saviour.
It is an interesting fact that Ge tiles were
the first worshippers of the incarnate God.
Of the number of the magi, of their rank, or
of the retinue by which they were attended,
nothing is known ; but their gifts — gold,
frankincense and myrrh — indicate wealth,
and were an acknowledgment of the superi-
ority of the individual to whom they were
offered. They had believed Herod to be sin-
cere, and so intended to go back to him as he
had commanded ; but God spoke to them in a
dream, and bade them return to their own
country by another way. Herod, doubtless,
waited anxiously from day to day expecting
the return of the magi, and when he was at
length convinced that they had left his king-
dom without giving him the desired iuforma-
tion he would become perplexed, indignant,
and greatly exasperated. Could Herod have
gained possession of their persons they would
have been the victims of his wrath. As has
been said of James II. of England so it may
truthfully be said of Herod : " When his own

*IHE HERODIAN FAMILY.

151

person was reflected on he followed the
delinquent like the panther prowling for his
prey, .... he never failed of pursuing his
victim to death." But now his anger recoiled
upon himself, and stung like a serpent and
bit like an adder. Did the magi worship an
infant, and dare disobey him ? Should a
subjjct Lj treated with greater respect than
himself ?

Herod had, doubtless, hoped to put the
young child to death without it being gene-
rally known ; his plans, however, being baf-
fled, it but remained for him to pursue another
line of policy. He who had been worshipped
by the magi must be slain. Some of Herod's
most trusty servants were, we may suppose,
accordingly dispatched with orders to find the
child, if he could be found, and put him at
once to death. One imagines these men
making the most rigid investigation of the
matter, and at length returning to the king
and reporting about as follows : " The people
of Bethlehem told us that a few hours after
the birth of a child of poor parents, who a
little before had come from Nazareth, some
shepherds declared that the child of such poor
parentage and such mean surroundings — he
was born in a mangbi* — was the promised
Messiah. ' We,' said the shepherds, ' were as
usual watching our flocks by night, when an
angel descended from heaven and we were
enveloped in a luminous cloud. Onr hearts
quailed with fear, but the angel told us not to

W"^

•■■'i«ife..**l,!K.^^ ,»^..

152

THE EDOMITES.

iiSah"*;!"*,^ !

fear, for the message he had come to announce
was a message of great joy to all people,
namely, that Christ the Lord was that day
born in the city of David. The angel had
hardly ceased to speak when suddenly there
appeared a multitude of angels, bright and
shining as himself, and with voiced loud,
sweet and clear, they sang :

' Glory to God in the highest,

And on earth peace among men in whom he is well
pleased.'

" The people said they knew not what to
say to the shepherds, for it could not be denied
that the condition of the child was in exact
correspondence with that described by the
angels. We were also told that the child
excited much interest when, on the fortieth
day after his birth, his mother brought him,
her first-born, to the temple to present him to
the Lord, and that Simeon and Anna, who,
you know, are allowed to have the spirit of
prophecy, spoke of him as a light to the Gen-
tiles and the glory of Israel."

The changing color of Herod's face would
plainly indicate his mental perturbation, and,
before the report was finished, we may sup-
pose him to have eagerly asked, "Where is
the child now ?" But the reply to this would
be very unsatisfactory. Herod would be told
that all that could be learned at Bethlehem
relative to the family was that, the day after
the rnagi left, Joseph bought a considerable
amount of clothing for the child and his

THE HERODIAN FAMILY.

153

mother, some provisions, and two of the best
asses that could be found ; and that he paid
for all these things in gold ; and also that he
told the man of whom he made the purchases
that he had myrrh and frankincense of which
he would like to dispose. The king would
also be told that those who were acquainted
with Joseph said that his character was above
suspicion, and yet they admitted that it was
unaccountable that he who was so poor a few
days previously that his w4fe availed herself
of the privilege of offering turtle doves or
pigeons instead of a lamb, should suddenly
become the possessor of so much gold. Herod
would probably conclude that the family had
returned to Nazareth, and would lose no time
in sending to that village and making the
strictest inquiry respecting them. This in-
quiry, however, would but result in the estab-
lishment of the fact that they had not been
seen there since they went to Bethlehem to
be enrolled.

The next night would possibly be to Herod
a sleepless one ; the troubled sea casting up
mire and dirt being a fit emblem of his mind.
That a child of whom wonderful things had
been predicted had lately been born was
clearly proved, and wherefore was he con-
cealed ? Miofht it not be that even now a
plot was laid to subvert the existing govern-
ment and proclaim the infant king ? The
child must therefore be slain. But how could
he be slain when it was not known where he

154

THE EDOMITES.

l-%

was? Was there not a probability that he
was still at Bethlehem ? It was evident that
he was born there ; and might not the story
about the things purchased by Joseph be told
to deceive ? The people of Bethlehem were
proud of the place of their birth. Would
they not expect peculiar favors from the
Messiah ? May they not have been all
leagued together in order to the child's con-
cealment; and may they not be maturing
plans for an insurrection ? As in chemistry
a compound is often altogether different from
the simples used in its formation, so the fiend-
ish cruelty which henceforth characterized
Herod was the product of remorse, fear and
anxiety. He was wretched himself, and he
seemed determined on making all around him
equally wretched. ITe had long been an
object of dislike, he was now an object of
terror. It, at length, occurred to his mind
that he could rid himself of at least one cause
of anxiety. According to the story of the
magi, the child who had given him so much
trouble must be less than two years of age,
and, consequently, if all the male children of
Bethlehem at and under that age should be
slain, he of necessity would be slain among
that number. The resolution to murder their
helpless, innocent children seems to have been
no sooner made than carried into effect. It is
not known how it was done. Matthew is the
only historian who has recorded this act of
cruelty and injustice ; and he has left us alto-

'^^^moL:.

THE HERODIAN FAMILY.

155

gether in the dark in regard to the particu-
lars of the tragedy. It would be quite in
keeping with the general conduct of this
Edomite if he ushered an edict requiring all
the mothers in Bethlehem who had children
at or under the age of two years to bring them
to Jerusalem on a given day, and when they
were assembled to cause them to be surrounded
by the tools of injustice, and their babes for-
cibly taken from them and slain before their
eyes. It is quite possible that the aored saints,
Simeon and Anna — the latter a temple-
dweller — were put to death on account of
their prophetic words, and, it may be, the
shepherds, too, for telling what the angels had
said — he would have murdered the angels
thems^^lves if such a thing had been possible
— and thus they would have participated in
the coming sufferings of their Lord, and then
entered the glory purchased by his prospective
death.

Parents are mourned, and most justly, for
they are their children's truest friends ; hus-
bands and wives are each by the other mourned,
for they twain are one flesh and one spirit, and
when separated by death the survivor not so
much lives as endures life ; children of mature
age are mourned for they are the hope, this
support, the pride of their parents, and to
bury them is to reverse the order of nature.
But to woman there is no bereavement which
is so much the dividing asunder of soul and
body, of joint and marrow, as parting from

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her babe. It is the burying of a part of
herself. What, then, must have been tlie
agony of these mothers of Bethlehem when
their little ones were ruthlessly murdered ;
themselves not even accused of any crime, and
their babes incapable of doing evil ! The
profane historians of Herod's time did not,
however, think it worth while to record the
act of tyranny which extended over only a
small tract of country, for the blood of these
children "was but a drop in that crimson
river in -'^^hich he was steeped to the very
lips." Besides, as they were only very little
children, it may have been thought that their
lives were of very little importance. But the
Infinite One, who inspired the mother's heart
with its deep, intense, unutterable tenderness,
thought this infanticide of sufficient import-
ance to make it a matter of prophecy some
hundreds of years previous to its commission.
Rachel, the beloved wife of Jacob is repre-
sented as lamenting the slaughter in incon-
solable grief. Is it quite certain that this is
a representation and not a reality ?

Had Herod carefully studied the sacred
writings of the people over whom he ruled he
would have learned that he who was born in
the manger of Bethlehem, though the Prince
of the kings of the earth, King of kings and
Lord of lords, had come to the earth, not to
conquer and rule but to labor and suffer, to
be despised and rejected, to bleed and die.
Herod, however, in common with most of his

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contemporaries, thought tliat the Messiah was
to be a renowned temporal ruler, who would
raise the J''ws to great national glory, and he,
therefore, had recourse to such measures as,
in his opinion, could not fail to nip the
incipient conqueror in the bud. Utterly
futile were all his schemes. God, who is
Wonderful in counsel and excellent in working,
not only knew the intentions of Herod, but
knew the*n afar off even before they were
known to himself, and had sent an angel to
the husband of the mother of Jesus the Christ
and told him to carry both the young child
and his mother to the land of Egypt and
there remain till he received permission to
return. Thus Israel's house of bondage be-
came an asylum for the world's Saviour.

The massacre of the children of Bethlehem
would but render Herod more and still more
unhappy. Though he concluded that nothing
farther was to be feared from the angel-
heralded child there was much to be feared
from his own conscience, espev.ially as it was
now evident to himself — it had for some time
been evident to others — that his end was
approaching. His disease was painful and
loathsome in the extreme, but at times his
anguish of mind was even greater than his
anguish of body. Pain in this instance was
not reformatory, and although it was accom-
panied with the more unendurable sensation,
remorse, it but rendered his hard heart harder
still, his selfishness more intensely selfish, and

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his cruelty more fiendish. Conscious that ho
was hated by his subjects, and yet being
and)itious of being, at least in appearance,
universally mourned, he ordtu'ed that the chief
men in his kingdom should be shut up in the
hippodrome, and then issued a decree that as
soon as he ceased to breathe they should be
murdered. Not satisfied with all the blood
he had already shed, and with those pros-
pective murders, he determined that one more
of his own family should bleed. His son
Antipator was the victim. Soon after the
perpetration of this most revolting murder
Herod was summoned into the presence of
the great Judge. As in the parable of the
rich man and Lazarus — if it be indeed a
parable, and not the relation of an actual
occurrence — it is said with emphasis of the
rich man, " he was buried," so the funeral of
Herod was conducted with the greatest possi-
ble pomp. The lifeless body was clothed in
purple and gold, and precious stones were set
around in great confusion.

But four of Herod's sons outlived him.
Herod, Antipas, Archelaus, Herod, Philip I.,
and Herod, Philip II. The three last named
will in accordance to the limits set to this
work, be passed over in silence, the Bible not
furnishing material for their history. The
mere fact is stated that Joseph was afraid to
make Judea his place of residence when he
learned that Archelaus reigned there ; and the
inference one would draw from that, namely

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that Archelaus was tyrannical and cruel is
abundantly contirnied by profane history.
Philip I. is simply alluded to as th«j husband
of Herodias, and of Philip II we are told that
he was tetrarch of liurea and the region of
Trachonites.

Though the scripture record relative to
Herod Antipas the tetrach of Galilee and
Perca is very brief, yet it is of such a nature
as to give us a pretty clear insight into his
character ; for as an artist can by a few
lines bring out the features of the face of a
man so that it is easily recognized by those
who know him ; so, at times, a very few acts
shew us one's moral status. We frst meet
with Herod Antipas as a listener to the
preaching of John the Baptist and yet living
with Herodias the wife of his brother Philip.

John the Baptist was a preacher " intensely *
practical, painfully heart searching, fearlessly
downright ;" and it would be well for the
interests of morality and religion if preachers
of the present day more generally followed
his example. To the tax gatherers John
would say : *' Exact no more than that which
is appointed you ;" to the soldiers : " Do
violence to no man, neither accuse any falsely,
and be contented with your wages." Did
John not incur a great risk of injuring his
popularity by such pointed admonitions ? He
too, was one of the very few preachers who
are as plain and outspoken in their admoni-
tions to the great as to those in obscure

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\\m

positions ; and he boldly declared to Herod :
" It is not lawful for thee to have thy brother's
wife." But lawful or unlawful Herod was
determined to retain the possession of Herodias.
He respected the Lord's servant, he listened
to his teachings, he obeyed many of his in-
junctions, he complied with many of his
requests, and thought that ought to satisfy
him. Both with John and with his own
conscience he would fain make a compromise.
With John that was impossible. He could
neither be blinded by gifts, nor seduced by
flattery. He would persist in telling the
tetrarch that it was in vain he left off some
sins, and practised some virtues i2 he continued
to hug his darling sin to his bosom ; but i.*: he
would please God he must obey all His com-
mands, yield Him his whole heart. Herod's
conscience was for the time more easily
silenced. Such is our moral nature that the
man who continues in a course which he
knows to be wrong, will feel less and still less
uneasiness relative to it, till finally he will
conclude that under his peculiar circumstances
it is allowable. His conscience will become
seared as with a hot iron. But let such a one
beware. His insensibility will not make evil
good, will not alter the nature of things.
Conscience though silenced is not dead. She
may even in this life inflict the dreadful pain,
the keen anguish, remorse, and in the future
state will be a never dying worm.

Herodias, having learned that John the

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Baptist had reproved Herod for his unlawful
relation to her, determined on revenge. Her
malice carried her so far as to cause her even
to wish that he should be put to death. She
would not, it is quite likely, assign the true
reason for this wish, but she could represent
to Herod that the man from the wilderness in
his camel's hair robe, confined by a leathern
girdle, who lived on locusts and wild honey,
was, despite his pretentions to holiness,
possessed of a devil, and therefore ought not
to be suffered to live. His life should be
sacrificed to the general good. But much as
Herod wished to please Herodias he dared not
put John to death lest it should occasion an
insurrection ; for the popular belief was that
he was a prophet. Herod at length concluded
that he could satisfy Herodias without injuring
his own popularity by imprisoning John and
yet allowing him free intercourse with his
friends and disciples. This was accordingly
done. The place of John's imprisonment was
a strong fortress perched on a lofty crag on
the east side of the Jordan. There he re-
mained for some time, and he might finally
have been released had it not been for the
implacable hate of Herodias. Woman, alas,
is as strong, as undying in her hatred as in
her love. Herod had, perhaps, quite forgiven
if not forgotten John's reproof Not so with
Herodias. She was as firm in her resolve of
accomplishing his death, and anxiously waited
to find Herod in such a state of mind as

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would enable her to induce him to issue an
order for the prophet's execution. Unlike the
Macedonian who appealed from Philip drunk
to Philip sober, she would appeal from Herod
sober to Herod drunk. Herod's birthday was
observed as a season of feasting and festivity
and she determined that on that day John
should die. So far did her desire for revenge
carry her that she was willing that her
daughter, in violation of the rules of propriety,
or even decency, should not only be present
on that festive occasion but should also dance
before the tetrarch and his guests. She had
doubtless also arranged that if her daughter
should be so fortunate as to please Herod and
have the oifer of any gift she wished she
should ask for the Head of John the Baptist.
The next birthday celebration was at
Machaesus where John was imprisoned. This
was probably at the particular request of
Herodias, professedly on account of the beauty
of the situation, but in reality that she might
the more easily carry out her fiendish design.
The feast is prepared and all the lords, chief
captains, and leading men of Galilee are
assembled. In the midst of their revelry
Salome enters. Herod and his guests are
delighted, and even more surprised than
delighted. But Salome does more than the
mere dlowing of these men, heated with wine,
to gaze upon her beauty — she dances before
them. The results are as Herodias had anti-
cipated. Herod was charmed with the per-

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formance, and promises on oath to give her
whatever she shall ask. Well did the young
girl remember the command of her mother,
yet she could not believe that the head of
John would really be preferred to all the
valuable gifts in the power of Herod to
bestow. She ran, therefore, to her mother,
saying : " What shall I ask ?" Herodias, per-
haps annoyed that Salome had not at once
acted in accordance with her instructions,
would reply : " Have you forgotten what I
said ? Ask for the head of John the Baptist,
and ask that it be given you immediately."
Salome, having again entered into the presence
of the tetrarch, said : " I will that thou forth-
with give me in a charger the head of John
the Baptist." Though Herod was partially
intoxicated, yet when he heard the request of
Salome he was horroif-stricken. He knew
that John was a good man, and that he had
been most unjustly imprisoned ; and he was
extremely unwilling to stain his hands with
that prophet's blood ; and, besides, the murder
could not fail of being known, and might
render him unpopular. But what could be
done ? Had not his guests heard his promise
and his oath, and would they not think him
a coward should he show any hesitancy in the
matter ? Would it not be better to murder
John, innocent though he was, than to sacri-
fice his honor ? and would not his honor be
.♦iacrificed if he did not keep his oath ? And
then, really, was not his oath binding ? was

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. Il

he not under obligation in the eyes of heaven
even to keep it ? Since he was so situated
that he could not avoid doing wrong, might
he not commit the wrong which would ^ain
for himself the esteem of his friends ? Then,
again, would it really be a wrong towards
John ? What comfort was there to him in
life ? He neither feasted nor wore soft
clothing. To a prisoner would it not be a
blessing to cease to be ? Thus fortified,
*' immediately the king sent an executioner,
and commanded his head to be brought ; and
he went and beheaded him in prison, and
brought his head in a charger and gave it to
the damsel, and the damsel gave it to her
mother." What a spectacle ! A daughter
presenting her mother with the bloody head
of one of whom she was virtually the mur-
derer ! Even at the great distance to which
we are removed, both in regard to time and
space, the thought of the horrid sight chills
one's blood ? Is it possible that its reception
gave Herodias joy ? Can there be joy in the
accomplishment of that which one knovvS to
be sinful ? Joy is one of the fruits of the
Spirit ; and is it not the perquisite of well-
doing, and of well-doing only ? Must not he
who lives in the wilful commission of sin be
to it necessarily a stranger ? Even the
laughter of the v/icked is as the crackling of
thorns under a pot, noise and a momentary
flame, and then but as ashes to be trodden
under foot. The tragedy was sojn over ; not

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165

its consequences. They will exist forever.
The tremendous guilt of Herodias by no means
rendered Herod guiltless. He ought not to
have imprisoned John ; he ought not to have
taken the rash oath ; he ought not to have
commanded John's execution. Though he
endeavored to convince himself that his con-
duct was justifiable, he knew it was not. He
probably experienced that fearful anguish
which has been termed by that intellectual
giant, Joseph Cook, " The innermost laughter
of the soul at itself." Is it not the God within
us which, to the finally impenitent sinner, will
mock at his calamity and laugh when his fear
Cometh ? Herod quailed with fear, though
he preserved an outward composure. He was
afraid that his guests would think him a
coward if he did not keep his oath. His
keeping it made him a coward, Every sin
will ultimately'' be repented of, but the repent-
ance may not be during the term of probation.
It is a principle in God's government that
what a man 30ws that he also reaps ; and as
in the natural so in the spiritual world, the
harvest far exceeds the seed sown.

Our adorable Redeemer passed a large
part of his life in Galilee, which was under
the jurisdiction of Herod ; and when Herod
heard of the miracles which the Redeemer
performed he became uneasy — if, indeed, he
had ever been other than uneasy since the
murder of John. Though a Sadducee he
concluded that that prophet had risen irom

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^E^Mj

iTPp

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166

THE EDOMITES.

the dead. As Herod did not believe in the
resurrection of the dead, and John wrought
no miracles, his coming to this conclusion
plainly indicates that he was the subject of
the most tormenting fears. Though in oppo-
sition to wjiat he up to that time had believed,
he felt that in some way he would again meet
the murdered man. He could not rid him-
self of the expectation of suffering on that
account. The verdict of his own conscience
was "Woe unto the wicked, it shall be ill
with him ; for the reward of his hands shall
be given him." Herod wished the miracles
would cease, or that He by whom they were
wrought would leave his territory ; yet he did
not dare to command Him to depart. The
plan at last devised to induce the Lord Jesus
Christ to leave the province of Galilee showed
considerable tact, and had he been dealing
with a mere man would probably have been
successful. "He sent emissaries to Christ who
were connected with the sect opposed to that
to which he himself belonged, and they came
as if they were Christ's friends and wished to
warn Him of approaching danger : " Get thee
out," said they, " and depart hence, for Herod
will kill thee." Their hopes of intimidating
Christ were miserably disappointed. His
answer : " Go ye, and tell that fox, behold I
cast out devils, and I do cures to-day and to-
morrow, and the third day I shall be per-
fected"— must have convinced them that
l.e perfectly understoed th» design ef their

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167

coming, and the motives and character
of Herod ; and that he had a work to accom-
plish in which he would not permit himself
to be interrupted.

Herod would receive the message of Christ
with mingled indignation and alarm. His
first impulse would be to punish the man who
had dared to designate him by the opprobious
epithet " fox," but he would fear that it might
not be safe to attempt to do so. It was beyond
contradiction that he had wrought miracles ;
w^ho could then prescribe limits to his power ?
He had restored life ; might he not by mere
volition take life away ? Herod would, there-
fore, conclude that there was no alternative
but to allow this personage, whoever he might
be, to remain in his jurisdiction as long as he
pleased to do so, and to go on unmolested
with his work.

The Lord Jesus Christ, having finished
the work his Father had given him to do in
Galilee, went over to Perea, and thence to
Jerusalem and its vicinity. The fears of
Herod would now be allayed, and curiosity
took their place. He would regret that he
had not improved some opportunity of seeing
the wonder-working man while he was in
Galilee. He would then have known for
himself whether he was John the Baptist or
not. If he was not the man whom he had
beheaded there was no cause for alarm. It
might even be advantageous to have one in
his tetrarchy who could open blind eyes

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unsfcop deaf ears, and at his pleasure multiply
provisions ; and besides he would like to
witness a miracle, he would like to see the
arm in strength and beauty coming out from
the shrivelled stump, or the dead returning to
life. At length an opportunity of seeing
Jesu s ^3hrist occurred, which gave Herod great
.di'ligl^t and still greater surprise. He was at
Jcrasaiorn, and there learned that the wonder-
working man who had occupied so much of
his thoughts was arraigned as a prisoner
before the Roman governor. Herod would
probably have gone at once to the place where
the trial was pending, had it not been that
there was a feud existinnf between him and
the said governor. The cause of the feud
was this : Some of the subjects of Herod
were offering sacrifices in the court of the
temple at Jerusalem, and Pilate, under the
pretext that they were inciting a riot, slew
them, thus mingling their blood with the
blood c^ the animals they had slaughtered.
During the trial — if trial it may be called
— of the Lord Jesus Christ, Pilate learned
that He had spent much of His life in Galilee,
and hence might be considered as belonging
to Herod's jurisdiction. Pilate at once resolved
to send the remarkable prisoner to Herod,
hoping thus to free himself from pronouncing
either a condemnation or an acquittal ; as in
the one case he would do violence to his own
conscience, in the other he would incur the
displeasure of. the Jews. Aijd besides, th^se

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considerations he desired a reconciliation with
the tetrarch ; and hence would be pleased to
have an opportunity of giving him a i ken
of respect, being so well acquainted wit\ his
character as to be convinced that a compli-
ment paid to himself would be an equivalent
for shedding the blood of his subjects.

Herod would look on the Lord Jesus Christ
with astonishment. " This man is not John
the Baptist," he would say to himself, "but
who can he be, his cou^ ue ^ance so marred and
yet possessing such ar awial grandeur ? But
may it not be that that which awes me so
much is merely the ru^ lor that he can W3rk
miracles ? Well, re Uy, I doubt the truth of
that rumor. At any rate he is impotent
enough now. If he has the power to raise
the dead, as is commonly reported, surely he
can deliver himself out of the hands of his
enemies ; and nothing is more certain than
that if he has such power he will exercise it."
Herod now questioned Jesus with many words.
He probably asked him of his parentage, of
his trade or profession before he became a
public teacher, of the number of his disciples,
of his doctrine, and of his authority to teach
that doctrine. But our Adorable Redeemer
knowing that these questions were prompted
by idle curiosity, answered him nothing. It
is very significant that it was before Herod
only that our Lord observed unbroken silence.
Herod perceived by the vehement accusations
of the Jews that they bitterly hated Jesus,

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and seems to have determined to gratify
their malignity by treating him with contempt
and scorn, if he could convict him of no
crime. Herod's body-guard, therefore, no
doubt by his command, arrayed our Redeemer
in a white robe — probably one which he him-
self had cast off — and rendered him mock
homage, but our Redeemer still remaining
silent, and the soldiers apparently tiring of
the dreadful sport, led our Redeemer, wearing
the white robe, back to Pilate, which seems
to have suggested the further insult of array-
ing our dear Redeemer in purple, as if he
aimed at the throne of the Cassars. This act
toward Jesus Christ, the Lord of glory, is the
last notice we have of Herod in the Scrip-
tures; but we learn from profane history
that he, at the instigation of Herodias, went
to Rome with the hope of obtaining the title
of king. His appearance in that city proved
his ruin, for charges of so grave a nature
were brought against him that he was ban-
ished to Gaul, where he passed the remainder
of his life. Like his forefather, Esau, " he
found no place for repentance, though he
sought it carefully with tears."

Herodias voluntarily accompanied Herod
to his place of banishment, and, although all
right-minded persons must heartily detest
her character, yet as she had shared with
Herod his prosperity it was noble and womanly
to share with him his reverses. It is scarcely
possible for a woman to become thoroughly
selfish.

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CHAPTER XIV.
THE HERODIAN FAMILY — (Continued.)

^EROD AGRIPPA, the grandson of Herod
^^^ the great, at his introduction to our
notice, appears as a murderer. The family to
which he belonged was a family of murderers.
His ancestors in ancient times had been so
much the enemies of God's chosen people that
they typify all God's enemies — tjrod always
identifies Himself with His people as with
the prophet Zachariah : " Whoso toucheth
you toucheth the apple of His eye," — and his
immediate ancestor had persecuted Christ.
Agrippa's uncle, Herod Antipas, did not know
when he arrayed Jesus of Nazareth in a white
robe and rendered Him mock homage that He
was the King of Glory whom all the host of
heaven worshipped ; but he might have known
it, and hence his ignorance was not his
misfortune but his crime. Though Agrippa
persecuted the followers of Christ even unto
death he may not have had any decided
antipathy toward them, for he was one of
that class of men — unfortunately not yet
quite extinct — who are ready to sacrifice any-
thing or any body if by such means they can
promote their own interests. Agrippa saw
that when any of the Jews declared them-
selves the followers of Him whom they
had crucified they became obnoxious .0 their

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fellow countrymen, and it may have been
chiefly with the desire of increasing his own
popularity that he became a persecutor.
Saul of Tarsus was one of the bitterest and
most relentless of persecutors ; but he was at
the same time thoroughly conscientious. He
"verily thought he ought to do many things
contrary to the name of Jesus of Nazareth."
Agrippa never felt the weight of the word
ought and if that word had a place in his
vocabulary it would be used only when
speaking of the duty of others toward himself.
James, the brother of John, was the first
victim of Agrippa's cruelty. The burning
zeal of this son of thunder rendered him an
object of peculiar dislike to those Jews who
continued to reject Christ, and he was feared
even more than he was hated from the fact
that he could and did attest that while Jesus
was a man among men, he had on one occasion
seen His glory so unvailed that His face did
shine as the sun, and His raiment was bright
as the light, and had heard a voice from
heaven saying, " This is my beloved Son in
"Whom I am well pleased." To Agrippa it
was evident that both the character and the
experiences of James enabled him to exercise
a very powerful influence in favor of the new
religion, and that hence the Jews would not
be averse to his being put out of the way.
James was accordingly murdered, probably
decapitated. Though the murder was per-
petrated principally from a desire to please

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173

the Jyws, Agrippa was not quite certain that
it wouhl liave that eifect, and when he per-
ceived that it had greatly increased his
popularity he was elated, and determined to
ingratiate himself still furtlier into their favor
by continued murders. If he could make
friends by shedding the blood of the followers
of a crucified man he thought it well worth
his while to do so.

Peter was one of the boldest, and most
unconpromising of the advocatt^s of salvation
by Jesus Christ, and consequently he like
James was both feared and hated by Christ's
enemies. His searching appeal on the mem-
morable day of Pentecost was still fresh in
their memories, and still rankled in their
hearts. They often seemed to hear the unwel-
come words : " Jesus of Nazareth, a man
approved of God unto you by mighty works
and wonders and signs which God did by Him
in the midst of you, even as ye yourselves
know; Him being delivered by the determinate
counsel and foreknowledge of God, ye by the
hand of lawless men did crucify and slay ;
whom God raised up by having loosed the
pangs of death ; because it was not possible
that He should be holden of it ... . Let
all the house of Israel, therefore, know
assuredly that God hath made Him both Lord
and Christ, this Jesus whom ye crucified."
They were filled with anger again? the man
who had dared prefer such a cha) : i against
them, and were as eager to imbue their hands

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cli

in his blood as they a little before had been
to imbue their hands in the blood of his
Master. What ! charge them with killing
their own Messiah ! What ! assert that he
who had been crucified as a malefactor was in
reality their own Messiah ! how preposterous,
how absurd ! Such a man ought to suffer
death as the enemy of his countrymen.
Aggrippa was not ignorant that this feeling
relative to Peter prevailed, and, hence, selected
him for his next victim. He was apprehended
and cast into prison, and, as if he had been
one of the worst of criminals, sixteen soldiers
were appointed as his keepers. As four were
on guard at a time, and they required to
watch but three hours, and hence, could not
be overcome with sleep or fatigue, Agrippa
felt sure that his prisoner could not escape.
The feast of the passover was at hand or in
course of celebration, and it would have
shocked the religious feelings of the Jews to
try a criminal during these solemnities. They
were, as Solomon puts it, righteous over much
as well as overmuch wicked. Peter was kept
in prison several days, and during that time
the disciples met at stated seasons and prayed
for his deliverance. As the time drew near
when his execution might be expected they
would become more and still more earnest in
their supplications, but no assurance was
given that they were heard. The next morn-
ing he was to be brought forth, not so much
to be tried as to be executed. The faith of

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some of the younger disciples, perhaps, began
to waver, and hence they would ask if any
one present really knew that the Lord had
said, " If two of you shall agree on earth as
touching anything that they shall ask it shall
be done for them of my Father which is in
heaven." One imagines that on hearing this
question a cloud passed over the face of
Thomas as if he doubted whether the Lord
had said these words, but John, and Philip,
and Andrew in their earnestness almost sim-
ultaneously would answer, " Yes I heard him
say so myself." Encouraged by this promise
they would agree to meet at a given hour and
pray till God gave them some token that their
prayer was accepted. They would go to their
several homes but very little would be said
except what was said to God. Those who
could would spend their time in their closets,
not so much, however, in uttered petitions as
in sighs or groans, or in the repetition of the
name of the Almighty. As the little child
when in deep distress will often cry " mother,
mother, mother," so the child of God, when
no human ear can hear, in agony will some-
times cry, " O God, 0 God," Domestic duties
might deprive many of the privilege of retiring
to their closets, but none of the privilege of
prayer. The housewife would perform her
accustomed duties but her heart would be
lifted to God. She would say in a half
whisper: "My Father for Christ's sake," or
"Fulfil thine own promise." The father

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176

THE EDOMITES.

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would take his little boy upon his knee and
tenderly caressing him, musingly say : " If a
son shall ask bread of any of you that is a
father, will he give him a stone ? if he ask a
fish will he give him a serpent ?" His heart
told him that he would not thus treat his
child, and he would feel assured that his
Father in heaven possessed greater love and
tenderness than himself.

At the appointed hour the disciples would
again meet. There would be more of hope in
their hearts, and their countenances would
wear a more cheerful aspect, but many would
bear traces of the struggle through which
they had passed. Like Jacob they had
wrestled with God ; like Israel they had pre-
vailed. Some of their faces, it may be, like
the face of Moses on a certcim occasion, shone,
and that, like him, they would be unconscious
of it, while to others it would be a source of
great encouragement.

The try stir g-place was at the house of one
Mary, the mother of John Mark. There we
will leave the disciples and go to the prison
where Peter is incarcerated. Let us look at
him as he lies on the cold, dank earth between
two soldiers to whom he is chained. Sheckles
and instruments of torture are the chief fur-
niture of the room. The stone walls are
thick and high, and the heavily spiked door
is not only locked but guarded by armed men.
Peter is sweetly sleeping. As God's will was
his, he would be free from anxiety. To live

THE HERODIAN FAMILY.

177

to him was Christ, and well did he know that
to die would be gain even should he die by
the axe of the executioner.

The praying disciples, the persecuting
Herod, and the vigilant soldiers are not all
who are interested about Peter. He who
dwells in light unapproachable, who is wor-
shipped by all the heavenly host, cares for
him, and sends an angel to affect his release.
Prayer from day to day had ascended to
heaven, and had been presented to God the
Father by our great advocate, God the Son.
Is it not probable that much was eliminated
from their prayers before they were presented ?
These petitions were accepted when offered ;
but the great God in this instance as in many
others, put the faith of his chiklren to a severe
test that they might have a richer reward.

Suddenly the cell is filled with light, and
Peter is awakened by an angel who bids him
arise. Peter did not say " Do you not see that
I am chained to my guards and cannot rise
till it is their pleasure to do so ;" but he at
once made an effort, and the chains fell from
his hands. He then, in obedience to the com-
mands of the angel, girds himself, binds on
his sandals, casts his garment about him, and
follows w^here he leads.

One naturally asks: Where or in what
condition were the soldiers to whom Peter had
been chained ? Were they asleep, or were
they awake but their senses so holden that
they were insensible to what was passing

I 4

II,

-fpmmigf§iiiti^'

178

THE EDOMITES.

around them ? or, again, were tb-jy fully con-
scious of what was passing but so awed by
the angel's presence that they dared not make
any resistance, and, indeed, felt that to attempt
resistance would be utterly vain ? Bolts and
bars and adamantine walls seem not to inter-
fere with the passage of spiritual bodies, but
Peter was flesh and blood, and, consequently,
if he would leave the prison, needed some way
of egress ; and it would appear that, by the
touch of the angel's hand or by his mere
volition the heavy iron bolts drew back, and
the ponderous door opened. By some means
the soldiers at the prison door, like those to
whom Peter had been chained, were rendered
powerless. There was a court or avenue
which connected the prison with the city, at
the termination of which was an iron gate
which opened to them of its own accord.
Having done all that was needful to do for
Peter in order xl r v he might procure his own
safety — God neve vloes or causes that to be
done for us which we can do for ourselves —
the angel left him to minister to some other
heir of salvation.

One would like to follow Peter, to notice
the lighting up of his countenance as the fact
that God had indeed sent a glorious angel and
released him from prison was felt to be a
reality ; to observe his eagerness to reach the
house of Mary and tell of his deliverance ;
and to Tvoe the surprise — it i^ strange that they
should be surprised — and the delight of the

THE HEROPIAN FAMIL"*"

179

:bey
th©

disciples at his coming. But we leave hhr
learn how Herod Agrippa is affected by riie
escape of h^'s prisoner.

When the watch was relieved, to the u^^t;^
astonishment of those who had just come on
duty, there was no prisoner to watch. The
doors were unlocked, and he who kept the
keys deposed on oath that he had not un-
locked them, and that the keys had been all
night in his possession. Blank astonishment
and black despair were depicted on the faces
of the soldiers. They had neither been guilty
of the commission of any crime nor of the
neglect of any duty ; but their prisoner had
escaped, and they knew that they would be
put to death.

Herod Agrippa, full of schemes to increase
his popularity by persecuting the follower^^ of
the crucified One, had, we may presume,
passed a sleepless night. In his my,:> ';ina.'ion
he would see the lifeless body of Pe^ r ca- ried
forth, and hear the populace applaii i hm zeal.
While busy with these thoughts, it k pre-
sumed, Blastus entered 'lis chamber his coun-
tenance plainly indicating great perturbation
of mind, and that, before he had time to tell
of the strange event Agrippa anxiously asked :
*'What is the matter?" Blastus would tell
him that Peter had made his escape, and that
the guard declared that they were altogether
ignorant as to the means b}
been effected. Agrippa would
and disappointment, and orde

which it had

'(;

180

THE EDOMITES.

diligent search be made in every place where
it was possible that the late prisoner could
have secreted himself. The guard would be
then examined and condemned to death. This
sentence excited no surprise, for, if it was not
admitted that Peter's escape w^as miraculous,
it would be incredible that he should leave
the prison without the aid, or at least the
connivance, of his keepers. Is it wdthin the
range of possibilities that one could escape
who was chained to two men, and within a
prison securely locked, closely barred and well
guarded ?

Agrippa was doubtless convinced that
Peter's rescue had been effected by superhuman
power but he would not think it prudent to
avow his convicHons. To admit that the
great God had interposed for the safety of a
follower of Jesus of Nazareth was equivalent
to acknowledging that Jesus was in reality
what he claimed to be, the Son of God; and
w^ould not that acknowledgment cause some
of his friends to become his enemies ?

One end which the Lord Jesus Christ had in
coming into the world was to bear witness unto
the truth ; and to all his true followers truth
is even dearer than life. But to truth Agrippa
would never have been a martyr. He proba-
bly a-ked not what he ought to believe, but
what would be most for his interest to profess
to believe ; not what he ought to do, but what
would be most for his interest to do. But the
all important question, "How can I most

THE HERODIAN FAMILY.

181

effectually serve myself?" could not now be
easily answered. Would it not look like a
diminution of zeal should he cease to per-
secute the followers of Jesus of Nazareth ?
But his utmost efforts had been baffled, and
might they not be baffled again ? and would
not that have a tendency to lessen the respect
in which he was held by his subjects ? At
length Agrippa concluded to return to the
official residence of his family, Csesarea.
There being few, if any, believers of Jesus
in that city, he, of course, would not be
expected to continue the work of persecution.

Csesarea was built by Agrippa s grand-
father, Herod the great, and was about seventy
miles from Jerusalem, on the great road from
Tyre to Egypt. It was, in every respect, a
very desirable place of residence, and there
Agrippa, no doubt, hoped and expected to
spend many years in pleasure. True, he had
been thwarted in his efforts to become re-
nowned as a zealous Jew ; but might he not
gain notoriety as a worshipper of pagan gods ?
And, indeed, was it not possible that he might
himself be regarded as a god ?

Men are most ready to grant favors when
they themselves are happy. The Tyriana
and Sidonians were evidently aware of this,
and, although they had incurred the displea-
sure of Agrippa, and feared that the result of
his displeasure would have a disastrous effect
upon their commercial relations, they deferred
making an effort for a recouciliatioa till the

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182

THE EDOMITES.

\!\i

time of the celebration of the annual games,
and, even then, they took the precaution,
before they approached the king, to gain tlie
friendship of Blastus, the king's chamberlain,
who seems also to have been his favorite.
During the festivities a large deputation from
the renowned cities of Tyre and Sidon came to
the king, desiring peace,, The deputation was,
doubtless, successful, not perhaps, because the
king saw the justice of their claims, but
because the circumstances by which he was
surrounded, disinclined him to a refusal.
Little did Agrippa think that his kingly
power was about to come to an end. On the
second day of the games Agrippa entered the
theatre arrayed in a silver robe, which so
reflected the rays of the rising sun as in bril-
liuncy to becomes the sun's rival. The feel-
ings of the common people, who are always
easily affected by external splendor, are
kindled to admiration's loftiest heights ; and
when he made an oration, in which — having
much of the fond nature of Herod Antipas—
he flattered the assembly into a willingness
to flatter himself, their admiration culminated
in adoration, and the impious shout arose :
" It is the voice of a god and not of a man.'*
Agrippa had now reached the zenith of
his ambition. The long, loud applause was to
him as grateful incense. He was, at length,
duly appreciated. Was it not likely that sac-
rifices would be offered to him ? Were not
sacrifices his right from the ignoble herd that

'««♦??";;■

THE HERODIAN FAMILY.

183

had been permitted to lool^^ on his face and
listen to his voice ? An angel of God smites
Agrippa, perhaps the same angel that for a
different cause and with a different effect
smote Peter; or it may have been he who
hundreds of years previous smote the Assy-
rians. Ah ! what means this pain ? Pain so
excruciating as to exact all his powers of
body and mind. Fain would he conceal his
condition from his worshippers, but conceal-
ment is impossible. He is constrained to
leave the theatre and to retire to his chamber
and his couch, and there writhe in agony till
the disease terminates in death.

Tophar, the Naamathite says: "The
triumphing of the wicked is short." This is
invariably true ; for even if the whole life of
the wicked should be a season of triumph —
and sometimes " they are not in trouble as
other men, neither are they plagued like other
men " — and life be prolonged to its remotest
verge, yet, when compared with eternity, it
v/ould be but as a moment. But the season
of triumph was emphatically short. In the
midst of his days he was unexpectedly and
suddenly arraigned before God his Judge, to
receive according to his deeds, to reap the
harvest of that which he had sown.

Agrippa II., the seventh and last male
member of the Herodian family who is men-
tioned in the Scriptures, is referred to but
once ; that, however, is on an occasion of great
interest, and one which gives us a pretty clear

184

THE EDOMITES.

insight into his character. Agrippa visited
Festus shortly after the latter was appointed
procurator of Judea, and during this visit
Festus told Agrippa that he had in his custody
a prisoner against whom the Jews were very
clamorous. He had supposed, he would . oy,
that the prisoner, a travel- worn old man, had
been guilty of some flagrant crime, as the
malice of his persecutors had remained una-
bated during the space of two years, but when
the said prisoner was brought out for trial,
though accused of sedition, the accusation was
not confirmed by even the semblance of truth.
All, indeed, that the accusers could prove, and
that the accused did not wish to deny, was that
he differed from tLem on some religious ques-
tions, and affirmed that one Jesus whom they
had crucified as a malefactor, between two
other malefactors, had risen from the dead
and ascended to glory. Festus further told
Agrippa that he, being conscious of his unfit-
ness to judge in such matters, asked Paul, for
such was the prisoner's name, if he would go
to Jerusalem and there be judged, but the
prisoner had objected to being sent thither,
and had appealed unto Caesar.

Agrippa would be deeply interested in the
recital of Festus, and especially in hearing
the afiirmation of Paul relative to Jesus of
Nazareth, He undoubtedly had heard of the
infanticide of which his great-grandfather
had been guilty with the expectation of
destroying thi« per^nage in his infancy ; he

THE HERODIAN FAMILY.

185

must also have heard of the insults heaped
on Jesus Christ by his great-uncle, Herod
Antipas ; and full well did he know that his
father had killed one of this man's disciples
and imprisoned another. Nor of Paul could
Agrippa have been wholly ignorant. He could
hardly fail to know that for several years he
had been under the instruction of the far-
famed Gamaliel, and that in early manhood
he had not only been a strict observer of
Jewish rites, and a zealous advocate o^ Jewish
laws, but also a most uncompromising foe of
the followers of Jesus, insomuch that the
bitterest enemies of the new sect were even
more surprised than delighted at his conduct ;
for although he was a man of cultured mind
and refined feelings, Vie invaded the sanctity
of the domestic circle, and brought not only
fathers and husbands but wives and mothers
to Jerusalem to be imprisoned or scourged,
" being exceedingly mad against them." To
Agrippa it must have seemed strange beyond
measure that such a persecutor should join
the persecuted, and maintain, in the face of
the strongest opposition, that one who had
been publicly executed some quarter of a
century previously was still alive. From all
that Agrippa had learned of Paul he naturally
and rationally would come to the conclusion
that if he was perfectly sane there must exist
good reasons for his apparent absurdities.
The curiosity of Agrippa was aroused, and he
" said unto Festus I would also hear the man

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THE EDOMITES.

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myself." To this Festus courteously replied :
" To-morrow thou shalt hear him."

On the next day Agrippa and Bernice and
the chief men of the city being assembled in
the place of hearing, "at Festus' command
Paul was brought forth," and Festus, in a few
clear, terse sentences, sets the case of the
prisoner before them. A brief silence would
ensue, and all eyes would be turned towards
the diminutive, pale, blear-eyed, wrinkled,
grey-haired old man who stood there a pris-
oner before them, and relative to whom the
Jews had given the procurator much trouble.
Agrippa broke the silence by telling the pris-
oner that he was permitted to speak for him-
self. The chains clanked as Paul rose, yet
was there not something in his bearing which
convinced all present that he was no ordinary
man ? Would not both king and procurator,
despite their efforts to appear unmoved, quail
before him ? But if they were convinced of
Paul's superiority as they merely looked upon
him, how were these convictions heightened
as Jie proceeded in an address of almost
unrivalled eloquence ! The address " may be
compared to a great tide ever advancing
irresistibly toward the distant shore, but
broken and rippled over every wave of its
broad surface, and liable at any moment to
mighty refluxes as it foams and swells about
opposing sandbank or rocky cape."*

Of this address, so universally and so justly

♦ Farrar'g Life of Paul, p. 67.

THE HERODIAN FAMILY.

187

admired, I shall notice only such passages as
aid in the understanding of the character of
Agrippa. Though the euphemisms found in
the writixigs of Paul indicate that he was no
less the gentleman than the scholar and the
Christian, yet such was his fidelity to truth
that one cannot doubt but Agrippa really was
what he is here represented as being.
Agrippa then was "expert in all customs and
questions which were among the Jews," It is
difficult, if not impossible, to ascertain just
what this implies, but surely one is safe in
saying that it implies a thorough knowledge
of the Mosaic ritual, and of the various ques-
tions which were debated between scrupulous
Pharisee, the pleasure-loving Sadducee,and the
austere Essene; and, consequently, Agrippa
must have read and reflected much, and have
been in the habit, when listening to a discourse,
of garnering the thoughts presented. He
who does this is intellectually above ordinary
men.

The character of Agrippa is further seen
by Paul's appeal to him when Festus accuses
him of insanity : " The king knoweth of
these things before whom I speak freely ; for
I am persuaded that none of these are hidden
from him, for this thing was not done in a
corner." Agrippa then not only read and
reflected much, but was also carefully obser-
vant of passing events, and kept his mind
open to conviction, even to unpalatable truth.
Did not Agrippa possess a considerable amount
of candor?

188

THE EDOMITES.

" King Agrippa," said Paul, " believest thou
the prophets ? I know that thou believest."
Knowledge is necessary to belief. We may
hence infer that Agrippa was a diligent stu-
dent not only of the Pentateuch, but also of
the other parts of the Old Testament. He
believed the Scriptures to be the Word of
God, that "holy men of God spake as they
were moved by the Holy Ghost, and his mis-
conceptions of the promised Messiah had
arisen from his looking for a temporal not a
spiritual king, and from reflecting on such
prophecies as spoke of the glory and extent
of the Messiah's kingdom, to the exclusion of
those that told of a period of humiliation
and suffering, terminating in death. To us
who read prophecy in the light of history it
appears marvellously strange that one could
read the fifty-third chapter of Isaiah, '^-r
instance, and not understand that the Christ
was to suffer and die. But it can excite no
surprise that this unregenerated Edomite
should expect a temporal king, when we
remember that Christ's own disciples, under
his daily instructions, clung with the greatest
tenacity to the same idea. What pathos in
the words : " We trusted it had been he who
should have redeemd Israel."

Agrippa had, doubtless, followed Paul with
the most intense interest as he told of the
vehemence of his hatred against Christ, and
against Christ's followers, which had caused
him to persecute them even unto strange

THE HEBODIAN FAMILY.

189

cities ; of the arrest on the way to Damascus,
the light which eclipsed the noonday sun, the
voice from heaven, the identification of Jesus
with his persecuted followers, the commission
received, his willingness to accept this com-
mission, of the persecutions he had since
endured, and of hia determination still to
proclaim to Jew and Gentile salvation through
the sufferings and death of Jesus of Nazareth,
the Christ of God. To Agrippa's logical mind
it would be evident that if PauFs story was
true — and his change of conduct could be
accounted for on no other hypothesis — he who
had been crucified as a malefactor between
two thieves was indeed the long promised
Messiah, through whom alone salvation was
obtainable; and that, hence, he ought to
accept him as his Saviour, and acknowledge
himself a disciple of that Saviour. These
were his convictions, but then what would
follow such an acknowledgment ? Would not
all present, including Festus and Bemice,
think him weak ? And would not his own
subjects look upon him with suspicion if not
with contempt ? Might it not cost him even
his crown and dignity ? His convictions must
be stifled at once. Having come to this con-
clusion Agrippa, with his lip curled with
scorn, said to Paul : " With but little persua-
sion thou wouldest fain make me a Christian ;"
and perchance added, " but thou hast mistaken
me ; I have too much manliness to be thus
duped." To Paul it would b© evident that he

: \

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190

THE EDOMITES.

could no longer hope for the salvation of
Agrippa, and it must have been with feelings
of unutterable sadness he answered : " I would
to God that, whether with little or with
much, not thou only, but also all that hear me
this day might become such as I am, except
these bonds." ^ ^

Agrippa ma^ have <falke4 of manliness in
refusing to become a Christian, but did he not
feel that he was actuated by the basest cow-
ardice ? Poor Agrippa ! there is no prof that
either by little or much he was ever persuaded
to be a Christian, or was ever again as near
the kingdom of God. He might have yiekLd
to his convictions and openly confessed
Christ, and the confession of his lips would
have strengthened the belief of his heart.
As the man with the withered hand received
the necessary strength when he made the
necessary effort, so if Agrippa had confessed
his conviction of the truth of Christianity
stronger convictions would have been expe-
rienced, and greater faith imparted. To a
many, and only to as many, as receive Christ
power is given to become the sons of God.
Nothing can be more dangerous than trifling
with convictions. The Spirit may be grieved.
He may withdraw his influence, and then the
soul is lost, eternally lost ; for none can come
to Christ unless drawn by the Father.

From Josephus we learn that when the
troubles commenced which ended in the de-
struction of Jerusalem Agrippa used his best

THE HERODIAN FAMILY.

191

endeavors to procure peace and order; but
finding his efforts vain he joined his troops
with the Romans, and aided in the destruction
of that once highly favored but then devoted
city. He afterwards went to Rome where he
died at an advanced age. He seems to -have
been freer from vice tJ^an anjy^tller member
of the family "to jy^hiclr he* belonged.

Four women connected wi^ the Herodian
family are mentioned in the iNew Testament
— Herodias, Salome, Drusilla, and Bernice.
About all that is there said of the first
mentioned woman has already been told in
the history of the Herods. Her virtues were
few, her vices many. Salome has been referred
to in connection with circumstances which do
not raise her in our esteem. But both her
dancing in the presence of Herod and his
guests, and her asking for the head of John
the Baptist were virtually the acts of her
mother, who seems to have been one of the
very few women whose iron will subjects
other wills to their own. Salome was twice
married, first to her paternal uncle, Philip the
tetrarch of Trachonitis, and secondly, to
Aristoboleis, the king of Chalcis. " Drusilla
was daughter of Herod Agrippa I., and Cypros,
and sister of Herod Agrippa II. She was at first
betrothed to Antiochus Epiphanes prince of
Camuragene, but he refusing to become a Jew,
she was married to Azizus, king of Emera,
who complied with that condition. Soon after
Felix, procurator of Judea brought about her

192

THE EDOMITES.

seduction by means of the C3rprian sorcerer,
Simon, and took her as his wife. We f?nd her
in company with Felix at Caesarea, ana the
narrative implies that she was present at the
apostles preaching. Felix had by Drusilla a
son *named Agrippa, who^ with his mother
perished i * ijj^ enjptuin of Vesuvius under
Titus."* DrfflRUa ip aaid to liavc been remark-
able for her beauty which may liave been the
cause of her fall. One would like to know
how she was affected v.s Paul "reasoned of
righteousness, temperance and judgment to
come." Did she, like Felix, trernhle ? Mviy
she not have been present at the many inter-
views Felix had with Paul ? her object, let us
hope, being not to obtain money but to learn
of Christ.

Bernice was less beautiful, less amiable
and more wicked than her sister Drusilla, she
is mentioned in the Bible but once. On that
occasion she is in company with her brother,
Agrippa, with whom she lived under circum-
stances of gret>.t suspicion. One may well say
of her as has been said of Herodies, "She
took upon her to confound the laws of her
country." She with Agrippa listened to
Paul's relation of his experience, but as a
course of sin has a deadening influence it may
have been heard with perfect indifference.

"Immediately before the siege of Jerusalem
by Titus, in consequence of the influence of
John of Gischala, twenty thousand Idumaeans

* Smith's Dictionary of the Bible, Vol. I., page 626.

CONCLUSION.

193

were admitted into the holy city which they
filled with robbery and bloodshed. From this
time the Edohiites as a separate people, dis-
appear from the page of history though the
name Idumea still ^^stinued to be applied to

the eountry:^Jipniha>i Palestine as Jjate aS the
timeof:er5ne." ^ Jt M^^

** The cha&Eu^ter of the Hdoimles was drawn
by Isaac in his prophetic bleamng to Esau —
' By the sword thou shalt live. War and
rapintt were the only professions of the Edom-
ites. By the sword they got Mount Seir, by
the sword they exterminated the Morites, by
the sword tiiey long battled with their brethren
of Israel and finally broke off their yoke, by
the sword they won Southern Palestine, and
by the sword they performed the last act in
their long historic drama, massacred the guards
in the temple and pillaged the city of
Jerusalem."*

CHAPTER XV.

CONCLUSION.

^HE Scriptures plainly teach that the
great Supreme is a God of justice as
well as a God of mercy. The destruction of
the ante-deluvians, of the cities of the plain,
ari the story of the Amalekites may be ad-

* Smith's Bible Dictionary, Vol. I., page 664.

194

THE EDOMITES.

h \m

duced as instances in proof of this assertion.
But in the history of no people is God's
displeasure against sin, and his inflexible
justice more legibly written than in that of
the Edomites. Therf ^ ^^ letters of fire we
reftidy " Itjig an' evik thmg;ij"4w(ygtter to sin
against G^jj|| j ^ JT

Esau canSt htve failed tAhave had re-
ligious training. He was born of pious
parents, with whom he lived between
eighty and ninety years, and for fif teeiwears
— the most impressible years of his life — he
had the counsel, the instruction, and the ex-
ample of one of the most remarkable of
saints, his grandfather, Abraham. Hence, we
may conclude that F^au, when he went to
Mount Seir, possessed very considerable
knowledge of the true God, and this knowledge
ought to have been preserved in his household.
If " the invisible things of God from the
creation of the world are clearly seen, being
understood by the things that are made, even
His eternal power and Godhead, so that they,
— those who have no light but that of nature
— are without excuse," what shall be said of
the guilt of those who, in addition to the light
of nature, have much of God's revealed will,
and yet leave his worship for the worship of
idols ? God justly gives those over to a repro-
bate mind who do not like to retain Him in
their knowledge. God delights in mercy.
He multiplies pardons and judgment is His
strange work ; yet, " He cannot be an en-

CONCLUSION.

195

swatbingkisa without beinga consuming fire."*
One trembles as he reads the terrible words :
"The Lord hath sworn th.. the Lord will
have war with Amaiek fcom generation to
generation ;" ortb^A|j|lltoiore terrible, found
almost ^^^^l^tK/f^^jm^
canon : " ^D^efS^^iiMaitMvP|Fe impov-
erished, bu»we will rffiuriiBnd build the
desolate plaols ;'* thus saith the Lord of hosts,
" They shall build, but I will throw down, and
thewhftH call them the border of wickedness,
a'ncLW® people against whom the Lord hath
indication for ever." These people had their
time ffi gra*5e, and their time of grace passed
away for ever. With individuals as with
nations the day of grace may Dass away.
One may be unjust so long that he necessarily
will be unjust for ever. There is in the
nature of things a tendency to permanence of
character. One may so long be accustomed
to do evil that it is just ar possible for the
Ethiopean to change his skin or the leopard
his spots as for him to do good. How solemn
and awful are the words : " Because I have
called and ye refused, I have stretched out
my hand and no man regp,ided ; but ye have
set at naught all my counsels, and would
none of my reproof ; I also will laugh at your
calamity, I will mock when your fear cometh,
when your fear cometh as desolation, and
your destruction cometh as a whirlwind,
when distress and anguish cometh upon you ;

♦ Cook.

'it'

1: '!.

I -Hi

\i '

196

THE EDOMITES.

then shall they call upon me, but I will not
answer ; they shall seek me early, but they
shall not find me ; for that they hated know-
ledge, and did not^oose the fear of the Lord,
they would none^BjMA^j^sel, they despised
alM%^^6n|ttof, jfilSflHH of the

fruit qf^KMIf^f^fwP with

their own de^les*"^^ jT

But it is probal)||e that the gjeater number
of those who are^ lost are nc^t those who
sin away the day of grace while 4ifi
those who are guilty of enormous M
those who simply "neglect the great
tion." The way to eternal life is still
and the gate strait, and they who would
enter therein must make a strenuous efforts
do so, while it is easy to float with the multi-
tude down the broad way. "He iMfffi
believeth not is condemned already, because
he hath not believed in the name of the only
begotten Son of God." But " believe on the
Lord Jesus Christ and thou shalt be saved.**
"If thou shalt confess with thy mouth the
Lord Jesus, and shalt believe in thy heart
that God hath raised Him from the dead,

THOU SHALT BE SAVED."

rroW"

but I will not
arly, but they
y hated know-
3ar of the Lord,
I, they despised
' eat of the
lied with

^Pater number

aqt those who

^hile i^Vfk nor

mous dA 1^

[le great jPilva-i

i is still narrow

ey who would

enuous efibr|4<^

with the mult|-

jr. "He ti|t

ready, because

le of the only

believe on the

lalt be saved."

ihy mouth the

in thy heart

om the dead,

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